IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/pra/mprapa/124674.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Determinants of Female Employment in Agriculture, Industry, and Service Sector: A cross country analysis

Author

Listed:
  • Roy, Kusumita Bardhan
  • Tripathi, Sabyasachi

Abstract

Globally, women are still less likely than men to enter the workforce. Since 1990, the gender gap in labour force participation has remained at 30% worldwide. Female employment is critical to economic stability and personal development, providing financial security, purpose, and societal contribution. However, technological advancements, R&D, and economic fluctuations constantly shape global employment opportunities, resulting in significant disparities across sectors. This study investigates the determinants of female employment separately for agriculture, industry, and service sectors, using data from the World Development Indicators (WDI) from 2004 to 2023. The Feasible Generalized Least Squares (FGLS) panel regression results show that different factors contribute to female employment in different sectors. Reducing the female contribution to family work and fertility ratio is important for reducing female employment in agriculture. Exports of goods and services and female self-employment are essential for increasing female employment in the industry sector. Additionally, domestic credit to the private sector, labour force participation rate, labour force with basic education, and life expectancy at birth need to be encouraged to increase female employment in the service sector. Finally, relevant policies are suggested to increase female employment for sustainable economic growth.

Suggested Citation

  • Roy, Kusumita Bardhan & Tripathi, Sabyasachi, 2025. "Determinants of Female Employment in Agriculture, Industry, and Service Sector: A cross country analysis," MPRA Paper 124674, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:124674
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/124674/1/MPRA_paper_124674.pdf
    File Function: original version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Stephan Klasen, 2019. "What Explains Uneven Female Labor Force Participation Levels and Trends in Developing Countries?," The World Bank Research Observer, World Bank, vol. 34(2), pages 161-197.
    2. Francine D. Blau & Lawrence M. Kahn, 2017. "The Gender Wage Gap: Extent, Trends, and Explanations," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 55(3), pages 789-865, September.
    3. Kucera, David & Tejani, Sheba, 2014. "Feminization, Defeminization, and Structural Change in Manufacturing," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 569-582.
    4. Oluyemi Theophilus Adeosun & Kayode Ebenezer Owolabi, 2021. "Gender inequality: determinants and outcomes in Nigeria," Journal of Business and Socio-economic Development, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 1(2), pages 165-181, July.
    5. Cheryl R. Doss, 2018. "Women and agricultural productivity: Reframing the Issues," Development Policy Review, Overseas Development Institute, vol. 36(1), pages 35-50, January.
    6. Meghana Ayyagari & Thorsten Beck & Asli Demirguc-Kunt, 2007. "Small and Medium Enterprises Across the Globe," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 29(4), pages 415-434, December.
    7. Tunyi, Abongeh A. & Areneke, Geofry & Tob-Ogu, Abiye & Khalid, Sharif, 2023. "Doing more with more: Women on the board and firm employment," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    8. repec:eme:jbsed0:jbsed-01-2021-0007 is not listed on IDEAS
    9. Noha Emara, 2016. "Fertility and Female Employment: A Panel Study on Developing Countries," Applied Economics and Finance, Redfame publishing, vol. 3(2), pages 122-127, May.
    10. Stephan Klasen & Francesca Lamanna, 2009. "The Impact of Gender Inequality in Education and Employment on Economic Growth: New Evidence for a Panel of Countries," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 15(3), pages 91-132.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Vo, Thang T. & Truong, Thiet-Ha, 2023. "Gender division of household workforce in Vietnam: Role of international trade and fertility," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 1696-1718.
    2. Nikolova, Elena & Polansky, Jakub, 2022. "Children and Female Employment in Mongolia," GLO Discussion Paper Series 1015, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    3. Elena Nikolova & Jakub Polansky, 2022. "Children and Female Employment in Mongolia," Discussion Papers 61, Central European Labour Studies Institute (CELSI).
    4. Zuazu-Bermejo, Izaskun, 2022. "Robots and women in manufacturing employment," ifso working paper series 19, University of Duisburg-Essen, Institute for Socioeconomics (ifso).
    5. Mustafizur Rahman & Marzuka Md. Al-Hasan, 2019. "Women in Bangladesh Labour Market: Determinants of Participation, Gender Wage Gap and Returns to Schooling," CPD Working Paper 124, Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD).
    6. Elena Nikolova & Jakub Polansky, 2022. "Children and Female Employment in Mongolia," Working Papers 396, Leibniz Institut für Ost- und Südosteuropaforschung (Institute for East and Southeast European Studies).
    7. Mina Baliamoune, 2021. "Trade and Labor Market Outcomes: Does Export Sophistication Affect Women’s Wage Employment?," Research papers & Policy papers on Trade Dynamics and Policies 2101, Policy Center for the New South.
    8. Nikolova, Elena & Polansky, Jakub, 2022. "Children and female employment in Mongolia," Economic Systems, Elsevier, vol. 46(3).
    9. Saudi‐Yulieth Enciso‐Alfaro & Salma Marhroub & Pedro‐José Martínez‐Córdoba & Isabel‐María García‐Sánchez, 2024. "The effect of COVID‐19 on employment: A bibliometric review of a she‐cession," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 31(4), pages 3444-3467, July.
    10. repec:ocp:rpecon:pp-15-21 is not listed on IDEAS
    11. repec:ocp:rptrad:pp-15-21 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Klasen, Stephan, 2020. "From ‘MeToo’ to Boko Haram: A survey of levels and trends of gender inequality in the world," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 128(C).
    13. repec:ocp:rpaper:pp-1521 is not listed on IDEAS
    14. Gautam Hazarika & Maroula Khraiche & Levent Kutlu, 2024. "Gender equity in labor market opportunities and aggregate technical efficiency: a case of equity promoting efficiency," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 56(23), pages 2806-2817, May.
    15. Mohammad Amin & Gomez Caceres,Norma Janeth, 2024. "Does Financial Development Reduce Gender Disparity in Top Manager Positions in Manufacturing SMEs in Developing Countries ?," Policy Research Working Paper Series 10711, The World Bank.
    16. Enyang Besong Susan & Manases Mbengwor Natu, 2023. "Re-imagining the Gender Gap in Economic Participation and Opportunities: Assessing the Link Between Sustainable Development and Gender Equality in Some African Countries," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 169(3), pages 817-845, October.
    17. Arora, Diksha & Braunstein, Elissa & Seguino, Stephanie, 2023. "A macro analysis of gender segregation and job quality in Latin America," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 164(C).
    18. Islam, Asif M. & Amin, Mohammad, 2023. "The gender labor productivity gap across informal firms," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 167(C).
    19. Afridi, Farzana & Dhillon, Amrita & Roy, Sanchari & Sangwan, Nikita, 2023. "Social Networks, Gender Norms and Labor Supply: Experimental Evidence Using a Job Search Platform," CAGE Online Working Paper Series 677, Competitive Advantage in the Global Economy (CAGE).
    20. Pascal L. Ghazalian, 2022. "The effects of the Arab Spring on female labour force participation in the MENA region," Economics of Transition and Institutional Change, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 30(4), pages 869-900, October.
    21. García, Carlos J. & González, Wildo D. & Rivera, Tiare, 2024. "Robots at work in emerging developing countries: How bad could it be?," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    22. Hyland,Marie Caitriona & Islam,Asif Mohammed & Muzi,Silvia, 2020. "Firms' Discriminatory Behavior, and Women's Employment in the Democratic Republic of Congo," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9224, The World Bank.
    23. Osman, Adam & Speer, Jamin D. & Weaver, Andrew, 2023. "Discrimination against Women in Hiring," IZA Discussion Papers 16598, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Female employment; agriculture; industry; service; FGLS regression analysis; cross country.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
    • J21 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Labor Force and Employment, Size, and Structure
    • O10 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - General

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:124674. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Joachim Winter (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vfmunde.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.