Making Caring Count April Newsletter Issue 3#4

Trends and innovations

Embracing the future with Mother A.I: an AI learning journey series designed specifically for working parents and caregivers to learn and grow. Mother A.I, from Stephanie LeBlanc-Godfrey a tech executive at Google, aims to empower parents and caregivers to embrace artificial intelligence to simplify their life. With easy-to-grasp education and support, Mother A.I guides subscribers step-by-step to integrate AI tools seamlessly into their daily tasks. Mother AI’s mission is to make AI inclusive, empathetic, and responsive to the needs of women, parents and families, thereby helping them unlock the potential of AI to conquer the invisible load. bit.ly/3JnesOB

Mogzit In-Home Care: a unique platform that connects professional nannies with parents seeking reliable childcare. In Ethiopia’s bustling capital city Addis Ababa, Samrawit Tarekegn is working to solve a common problem encountered by working parents: the lack of affordable, high-quality childcare. To address this issue, Samrawit founded Mogzit In-Home Care, dubbed the “uber for nannies”, with the aim of helping mothers return to their careers while simultaneously providing a reliable childcare system. Drawing inspiration from gig economy platforms in areas such as ride-hailing, holiday rentals, and food delivery, Mogzit currently receives over 20 nanny requests each day and is on track to become a market leader. The platform is accessible via the web and its services currently include the provision of part-time nannies, nannies-on-demand, and night nanny service. To further boost its service expansion and overall growth, Mogzit joined the Mesirat Program, a partnership between the Mastercard Foundation and Gebeya Inc. to empower 100 entrepreneurs in Ethiopia through multi-sided gig marketplaces. bit.ly/43ROV9O

The Netherlands’ Solid Start Action Programme focuses on parental wellbeing for a child’s best start in life. Discover how their integrated approach to childhood offers an innovative approach to childhood. The Solid Start Action Programme, launched by the Dutch government in 2018, is based on the belief that every child deserves the best possible start in life, and that parents play an important role in ensuring that this happens. The programme’s strategy is focused on supporting professionals who support families such as healthcare professionals, social workers and municipal government employees, in interacting more effectively with each other, and the informal networks on which families rely on. The programme, which entered its second phase in 2022, seeks to put a local Solid Start approach and interventions on a structural basis in every municipality, ensuring that new and future parents in vulnerable situations get the help, care, and support they need. Taking an integrated approach allows municipalities to better identify when parents need support and connect them with the service providers that can help. bit.ly/49zxgVI

News that made headlines

The global gender gap for women in workplace is far wider than previously thought, a new World Bank Group report shows. The latest Women, Business, and the Law report, paints a clearer picture of the barriers women face in entering the global workforce and contributing to greater prosperity — for themselves, their families, and communities. No country in the world provides women with the same equal opportunities as men, according to the report. For the first time, the World Bank investigated the impact of childcare and safety policies on women’s participation in the labour market in 190 countries. It found that when these two factors were included, women on average enjoyed 64% of the legal protections that men do — far fewer than the previous estimate of 77%. The report said that addressing the childcare gap would lead to a 1% increase in women’s participation in the labour force. Today, less than half of the countries in the report provide some financial or tax support for parents with young children. A fewer than a third had quality standards in place for childcare services, without which women might reconsider going to work while they have children in their care. Closing these gaps could raise global GDP by more than 20%, thereby doubling the global growth rate over the next decade. It would also be the key to amplifying women’s voices and shaping the decisions that affect them directly. bit.ly/3xxYIpm

News from around the world

A new study reveals how fictionalized portrayals of mothers on TV don’t reflect the lived experiences of moms in the U.S. Moms First, in partnership with the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media released a groundbreaking report that examines the cultural portrayals of motherhood on American television. The report was developed with the support of the Archwell Foundation. The paper, Rewriting Motherhood: How TV Represents Moms and What We Want to See Next, looked at scripted television shows from 2022 that featured moms in the lead roles. Its highlights progress in portraying more diverse moms on TV, but also highlights depictions of motherhood that represent unrealistic expectations for moms in today’s society, contributing to the guilt and shame mothers face today. The report found that moms on TV were not representative of the American population, with most being white, young and thin (57.5%). Furthermore, there were no portrayals of moms with disabilities, only 1.8% were overweight and 6.2% were queer. The dad was the breadwinner of the family 90% of the time on television shows, illustrating how TV families didn’t reflect real-life. The moms were also effortlessly attractive, their homes spotless and their childcare efforts largely ignored. The report spells out clearcut recommendations for entertainment industry executives to further develop the portrayal of motherhood in TV programming, and invest in structural supports such as childcare, paid family leave, and flexible work policies that support moms and allow them to work and thrive in the entertainment industry. bit.ly/3JfbLi7

Future of Development event: ‘Care matters: the business, policy, and gender lens for investing in care’. In recent years, there has been growing recognition of the urgency to support a sustainable, gender-transformative care economy with collaboration across governments, private sector and civil society. In light of this, EMpower — The Emerging Markets Foundation, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the University of Oxford recently convened a roundtable, featuring our Making Caring Count — Transforming Care in Africa founder Sharmi Surianarain and Sabrina Habib, co-founder of Kidogo for an action-oriented dialogue to discuss the constraints and opportunities of the care economy for development, livelihoods and businesses. This interactive roundtable spotlighted challenges and exemplars, and charted a course towards an effective care ecosystem that benefits multiple stakeholders- women, children, families, businesses and economies alike. bit.ly/3vTynBV

The unsung heroes: How women in Singapore disproportionately bear the burden of elder care. Singapore has one of the world’s fastest aging populations, with the island city-state on track to have a quarter of its citizens over the age 65 by 2030. First launched in 2015, Singapore’s $2.1 billion Action Plan for Successful Aging programme has been hailed as a potential global “blueprint” for enhancing the quality of life for the elderly. Despite being one of the world’s few success stories, its model illustrates the global challenge of addressing the disproportionate impact of aging societies on women. One of the reasons is that women spend more than twice as much time as men on unpaid care work for children and elderly family members. They are then more likely to face financial hardships due to being undercompensated for their work, leaving them with fewer resources to afford long-term care. To tackle the caretaker penalty faced by women, global response to aging needs a more gender-conscious approach, including more flexible employment conditions for women, government education initiatives aimed at women on personal finance and saving plans that consider the burden of caregiving, and increased funding for childcare and elder care resources.? bit.ly/3xBQ2P0

What we’re reading

Work, Retire, Repeat: The Uncertainty of Retirement in the New Economy. Book by Teresa Ghilarducci. Teresa Ghilarducci is a labour economist, retirement security expert, and author. In her new book, Work, Retire, Repeat: The Uncertainty of Retirement in the New Economy, Ghilarducci tells the stories of elders locked into jobs, not because they love to work but because they must. She challenges the notion that working longer is a universal solution to America’s pension shortfalls, pinpointing its negative consequences on older workers, particularly in physical jobs. Ghilarducci introduces the Gray New Deal, aiming to revamp America’s retirement system by increasing Social Security benefits and providing universal pensions, independent of employers. This plan seeks to address the inequalities exacerbated by the current system and ensure a dignified retirement for all. bit.ly/3U04bwN

What we’re listening to

Podcast: Thriving while Aching with Laurie Ferguson PhD. S2. Ep 5- Empathy and Planning: Navigating Caregiving Across Generations with Danielle and Cora. In this episode, host Laurie Ferguson delves into the multifaceted world of caregiving with Danielle, a certified financial planner and caregiver for her mother, and Cora, a caregiver for her aging mother who is juggling aches and pains. Danielle and Cora share their personal journeys of balancing self-care while providing unwavering support to their loved ones. From caring for loved ones with “invisible” conditions to handling mobility and accessibility issues, they offer valuable insights into caring across generations. Listen to full episode here. bit.ly/4cPrstZ