With free laundry and salsa classes, Bogotá tries to care for its unpaid caregivers

|
Peter Yeung
A dance class takes place at the Engativá Care Block in Bogotá, Colombia, in February 2024. The idea of these pioneering centers is to recognize the frequently unpaid labor of caregivers and potentially break down gender stereotypes around who can – or should – provide caregiving.
  • Quick Read
  • Deep Read ( 5 Min. )

There are 647 million full-time unpaid caregivers globally – nearly all of them women, according to the International Labor Organization. And if the 12.5 billion daily hours of care provided by these women and girls are valued at minimum wage, that work would be worth some $10.8 trillion annually, according to Oxfam, more than double the output of the global tech industry.

And yet, caring for children or older people is work that is rarely recognized, whether by governments, family, or simply the economy. The Colombian city of Bogotá is working to change that.

Why We Wrote This

A story focused on

Women shoulder most of the unpaid caregiving around the world. Colombia’s capital city is focusing on this population with free services in hopes of recognizing the value of their work – and redistributing it more evenly among men and women.

In 2020, Bogotá’s municipal government opened its first-ever Care Block, community centers targeting these unpaid caregivers with free services and classes, ranging from Pilates instruction to access to washing machines. The three main goals are to educate the public about the importance of caregiving, to reduce the overall care burden, and to encourage redistributing caregiving duties from women to men.

“These women are the heartbeat of society,” says Diana Rodríguez, Bogotá’s former women’s affairs secretary. “That’s why we have to support them.”

Gloria González has been caring for others since she was a child. From the age of 7, she was expected to tend to her little brother and make charcoal to sell.

Like many women in Colombia, Ms. González has frequently struggled to balance the burden of unpaid care duties with the need to work a job to pay the bills.

But two years ago Ms. González, who now cares for her grandchildren, came across a newly renovated building in Engativá, her low-income neighborhood in Bogotá. Inside, the bustling Manzana del Cuidado, or Care Block, changed the course of her life, after dedicating decades tending to others at the expense of her own professional experience and schooling.

Why We Wrote This

A story focused on

Women shoulder most of the unpaid caregiving around the world. Colombia’s capital city is focusing on this population with free services in hopes of recognizing the value of their work – and redistributing it more evenly among men and women.

“This place reminded me I wasn’t alone,” says Ms. González, beaming from a bench in a flower-filled garden in the multibuilding complex.

In 2020, Bogotá’s municipal government opened its first-ever Care Block in an attempt to recognize the vital, often unpaid work of caregivers like Ms. González. Each of the city’s 23 Care Blocks offers a dizzying range of free services specifically for caregivers, the vast majority of whom are women.

The idea is to recognize and lighten their load, and potentially break down gender stereotypes around who can – or should – provide caregiving. There are on-site laundromats, offices with legal aid and psychological support, sexual health clinics, yoga and dance sessions, and classrooms for study, as well as day care to watch children or relatives while their caregivers use the facilities. 

Peter Yeung
Gloria González, a caregiver who uses the Engativá Care Block in Bogotá, Colombia, is shown in February 2024. More than 30% of Bogotá’s female population – 1.2 million women – provides care full time without being paid, according to City Hall.

After just four years, already there are plans to expand the blocks, not only within Bogotá, but also in other Latin American countries.

“These women are the heartbeat of society,” says Diana Rodríguez, Bogotá’s former women’s affairs secretary, who helped develop the initiative. “We rely on them to raise us, to feed us, to clean up after us. That’s why we have to support them.”

Women shouldering unpaid labor

More than 30% of Bogotá’s female population – 1.2 million women – provides care full time without being paid, according to City Hall. Their work has the estimated value of the equivalent of 13% of the capital’s gross domestic product. 

It’s a similar picture worldwide. There are 647 million full-time unpaid caregivers globally, and nearly 95% of them are women, according to a 2018 report by the International Labor Organization. Women and girls provide 12.5 billion hours of care every day, Oxfam estimates, an output that if valued at minimum wage would be worth $10.8 trillion a year – over double that of the global tech industry. Analysis of data for 89 countries last year by UN Women found that women spend 2.8 more hours than men on unpaid care and domestic work every day.

Bogotá’s Care Blocks – which were created by former Mayor Claudia López, the city’s first female mayor – have been hailed as a groundbreaking effort to address that gendered care gap.

The services are clustered under one roof, and the centers are distributed evenly across the city. That means caregivers here can maximize their limited time instead of having to walk long distances, get stuck in traffic, or make multiple stops for different activities and services.

Peter Yeung
An infant is tended to at the on-site day care at the Engativá Care Block in Bogotá, Colombia, in February 2024. These centers offer child and elder care while their often unpaid, full-time caregivers are temporarily freed up to take classes or tap into resources like legal aid.

The Care Blocks are “a pioneering project in the region,” says Ana Güezmes, director of the gender affairs division of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), because they “address structural challenges that limit gender equality and women’s autonomy.”

Broadly, the program’s three main goals are to raise recognition of the importance of caregiving among the general public and caregivers themselves, to reduce the overall care burden, and to encourage redistributing caregiving duties from women to men.

Feeling free – and valued

The city spends $800,000 annually on the project, and the new mayor, Carlos Fernando Galán, has pledged to continue the work. That includes plans to nearly double the number of Care Blocks to 45 locations by 2035.

Meanwhile, ECLAC is working with federal governments in Chile, Colombia, and Brazil, and with municipalities in Mexico, to design “comprehensive care systems” inspired by Bogotá’s Care Blocks. 

“The creation of concentrated service areas are relevant for any urban context,” says Ms. Güezmes of ECLAC.

But there is still plenty of work to be done.

A 2023 study by the University of the Andes in Bogotá found that Care Block users often gained “a new meaning to care and their role as caregivers” and that the employment support had helped some women, though not many, find paid work.

The greatest challenge, however, has been getting men to take up care work, according to the researchers.

Peter Yeung
A drone offers a view of the Engativá Care Block in Bogotá, Colombia, in February 2024. These centers across Colombia's capital offer on-site laundromats, offices with legal aid and psychological support, sexual health clinics, yoga and dance sessions, and classrooms for study, as well as day care to watch children or relatives while their caregivers use the facilities.

“When we spoke to the caregivers, we noticed there was a change in [that] they saw their work as valuable,” says Natalia Ramírez Bustamante, co-author of the report. But redistributing the “work is much more difficult. It depends on the will of the husbands.”

The researchers also found challenges to accessibility for people with severe disabilities, and that some caregivers still have to travel great distances to reach the nearest Care Block.

And yet, the services have proved popular. Between January and March 2024, more than 45,000 women tapped into the centers’ resources, according to Bogotá’s City Hall. That includes 2,648 caregivers receiving employment training; 743 earning diplomas for information technology literacy and English, among other skills; and 1,822 using the free, on-site washing machines. 

Ms. González regularly does yoga, Pilates, and salsa classes, and uses the laundromat, and she took an entrepreneurial course to help her find work. As of last year, she runs a small shop selling fragrant herbs and essential oils, inspired by her grandmother.

“I have worked all kinds of jobs during my life,” says Ms. González. “But now I feel free; I feel valued. And I have a support network. It’s totally different.”

Solange Martinez visits the Engativá Care Block for English classes while her 18-month-old baby is looked after in the on-site day care. Before discovering this space, “I could barely leave the house,” says the young mother.

“Every day new women arrive to sign up,” says Jenny Paola Molina, coordinator of the Care Block in Engativá. Some centers have proved so popular that women must rotate in and out of the system once every three months so that everyone gets a turn. “Sometimes we have to turn them away,” she says.

On a recent sunny morning in Engativá, a salsa class is kicking off, with music blasting from the sound system. Ms. González is in the mix, moving to the rhythm among dozens of dancers.

“We women,” she says, “are stronger together.” 

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to With free laundry and salsa classes, Bogotá tries to care for its unpaid caregivers
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Americas/2024/0625/colombia-women-caregivers-unpaid-labor
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe