Opinion Accounting for gender economics
It will be interesting to find out the role of the transgender community in businesses,it is just a part of the gender dynamics.
Conducted nearly a decade after the last such exercise,the Sixth Economic Census is exploring two new issues the role of the transgender community in businesses and also the contribution of handicrafts to the economy.
Given the huge role of the unorganised sector that employs over 85 per cent of the workforce (as per a study by the National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector in 2007),inclusion of the handicrafts,which employs over 30 million workers,in the Economic Census was not surprising.
After all,the exercise is carried out to understand the changes in the economy through a headcount of all establishments in the country. The data so collected is the basis for making changes in the sectoral contribution to the gross domestic product as well as policy planning.
The headcount of businesses run by members of the transgender community is more surprising. Government sources said this was taken up at the behest of some states,who felt there was a need to separate transgenders from the male-female breakup of owners and workers in establishments. Though this was largely to better understand the gender dynamics in running a business,it will also be the first official headcount of transgenders.
A similar exercise was also started in the Population Census 2011 where transgenders were counted separately but were eventually clubbed together in the provisional results with Males,which stood at 623.7 million,comprising more than half the countrys total population of 1210.2 million.
However,statisticians,who are involved in tabulating the data,have said that though it will be interesting,it is just a part of the gender dynamics. The more important aspect of an Economic Census they point out,is the changes in patterns of entrepreneurship such as diversification of industries.
Significantly then,the exercise could bring out some interesting insights about the economy,which has in the interim weathered two crises the global financial crisis and the euro zone recession.
Surabhi is a special correspondent based in New Delhi
surabhi.prasad@expressindia.com
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