The olive harvest: a job less and less accessible to women
The olive harvest is widespread in the province of Jaén, and, as in recent years, women face many difficulties to find a slot in the field. The economic crisis, which has forced many unemployed to the fields, and mechanisation, are the excuses many growers use to reject the female workforce.
La recogida de la aceituna: un trabajo cada vez menos accesible a las mujeres
Rafa Quintana
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The problem is not in accessing traditionally male-dominated jobs, but rather that women are being excluded from tasks in which they have always had a place. The arguments including the physical strength needed to handle the machinery isn't convincing women who have been collecting olives since they were 16 years old.
There are fewer and fewer olive fields in which managers recognise that women are as useful as men. The exclusion of women from the labour market not only affects the lack of wages; but it also creates more difficulties to justify the day's wages needed to benefit from agrarian unemployment benefits.
