"In real estate specifically, India comprises of 50 million male workers against 7 million female workers,” The report released by Primus Partners in collaboration with World Trade Center India Services Council (WTCISC) stated. To combat that and offer meaningful solutions, the report further highlighted the best global practices adopted for enhancing participation in Real Estate and Construction from Australia, Japan, New Zealand, China, and Peru.
The report suggests that women in real estate also face a strong pay gap in labour workforce as well as in technical and leadership roles. “Women in technical roles earn 30-40 per cent lower than men and women in leadership roles in real estate earn 15 per cent lower than men in real estate,” the report read. The report further reveals that the real estate sector has the potential to employ more than 70 million people, however, the current estimate of 83.3 per cent of the more than 50 million total construction workforce remains unskilled.
The report also highlights the urgency for the governments to undertake five Lighthouse Housing Projects developed by an all-women crew that enables women to challenge gender bias and stamp their authority in the industry. Some suggestions made by the report also include policy changes in the area of improving workplace safety, providing gender sensitivity training, introducing skilling initiatives for women at all levels, and provision of specialised innovation and investment funds to improve the integration of women. It also suggests that women's gender inclusion in government contracts, setting up investment funds for women-led companies in real estate, enabling skilling across all levels, and building an equality policy that mandates female representation intending to disrupt gender stereotypes. It adds that it would be important to enable various programs of the workforce such as carpentry, plumbing, and other more specialized fields, specifically for women, to upskill themselves, and move up the value chain from daily wage labourers to transition into more technically advanced roles.
Talking to Business Today, Aarti Harbhajanka, Co-Founder and Managing Director, Primus Partners said, “Women’s contributions to the sector’s growth are invaluable because they are the backbone of the construction workforce and play an integral role. Owing to pre-existing notions, gender-based differential growth trajectories, bias, and exclusivity, the real estate sector remains a deterrent rather than a preferred sector for Indian women.” She added, “Future prospects for the industry will see more women taking on highly demanding roles in sales and marketing, finance, administration, and human resource management. This can be seen in the fundamental changes made to the RERA-established regulatory mechanisms, which have resulted in greater transparency in the real estate and construction sector. As we look to the future, women are increasingly disproving these stereotypes and shattering the glass ceiling.”
The report also shows women’s participation in various sectors and shows, occupations such as nursing, elementary and middle school teaching, social work, counselling, and HR comprised 19 per cent of India’s female workforce in 2021-22 as compared with the global average of 46 per cent.