This action research conducted by EILER examines how women in the informal sector in two urban communities in Manila make the most of available resources in order to rise above their seemingly disadvantaged situation within the economy.
The Philippines is Southeast Asia’s industrial sick man (barely any transformation since the 1970s) and agricultural failure (a major net importer of agricultural products since 1995). The country’s weak agro-industrial growth is the primary reason for the rapid expansion of the informal economy (employing as much as 2/3 of the labour force) and the country’s continuing dependence on the remittances of its 10 million or so migrant workers, roughly a tenth of the population.