Professor of Economics, Tripura University, Agartala, Tripura

The process of globalisation was for, all practical purposes,  set in 1991 in India for the country as a whole. Due to vastness and the diverse nature of the country, the impact of globalisation across the space and time has been quite different for different regions.  The Northeastern states with its geographic  isolation and communication bottlenecks has responded to the reforms in its own  way.
            An attempt has been made to scrutinise the employment scenario of women in the Northeastern states during the globalised regime. In order to study the situation, the two sets of data collected under National Family Health Survey at two different points of time at 1992-93 (NFHS-1)  and 1998-1999 (NFHS-2) – were scanned. NFHS-1 was conducted when the process of globalisation just started. And after the elapse of six and half year,  NFHS-2  was undertaken. It is, therefore, expected that a scrutiny of two sets of data  is likely to register the changes, if ever occurred  during  the period. The two data sets – namely NFHS-1 and NFHS-2 consist of huge information on many dimensions of  women’s life including the status of women, their education, employment and the standard of living etc. In this study, only a few indicators such as the mass media exposure of women in the Northeastern states, their employment and work-status were compared for the two sets of data of NFHS-1 and NFHS-2. The indicator of mass media exposure of women has been treated as the proxy variable for measuring the extent of globalisation taking place in the parts of the Northeastern Region of India. The work status of the women namely working in the family farm or business, employment by someone else, self-employment and not working in past 12 months has also been examined for the two periods for the purpose of comparison and contrast.
              A cursory look into the two data sets confirms that thirty seven percent of ever- married women  age 15 – 49 are currently employed which is up from 32 percent in NFHS-1 by 5 points in India. During the same period, the percentage of employed women in Nagaland increased from 43.7% to 62.8% registering an increase of 19.1 points. All other states except Tripura recorded increase in the  level of employment during the period. The table below gives the picture for the Northeastern states along with India.

Table : 1

Employment

Percent distribution of ever-married women age 15-49 by employment characteristics 

Source : NFHS-1 and NFHS-2

             Table-1 shows that in the case of Tripura, the percent of women employed declined by 3.7 points. The least growth in employment occurred in Assam which is up only by 1.5 point. The growth of employment of women in all the states except Assam and Tripura vary between 4.1 to 19.1 points in terms of growth of women employment. Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Mizoram and Nagaland are found to be ahead of all India average.
            The  better performances of Arunachal Pradesh  (+13.9), Mizoram (+14.7) and Nagaland (+19.1) in providing more employment for women are ostensibly due to the higher level of media exposure of women in the respective states. Table-2 below gives the media exposure scenario by the different states of Northeastern states.

Table:2

Exposure to mass media

Percentage of ever-married women age 15-49 who usually watch TV or listen

to the radio at least once a week. 

Source : NFHS-1 and NFHS-2 

It is seen from Table – 2 that due to the rapid urbanisation and spreading of mass media horizontally and vertically  among the womenfolk, the states in which women are widely exposed to mass media, thanks to globalisation are also ahead of other states in terms of growth of women employment. For example, Nagaland has an increase of percent of women watching TV by 23.6 points in urban area and 23.9 points in rural area, has also profound  increase in percent of women employment by +19.1 points. Of course, a fall in the percent of women listening radio in Nagaland is perhaps due to overwhelming penetration of TV network over the state. The same explanation seems to hold good for other states of Mizoram and Arunachal Pradesh. This phenomenon highlights the fact that where globalisation tends to take place as reflected  in the proxy indicator of mass media exposure, the employment prospects also improve. The notion held by many that globalisation, helps expand the level of employment of women is found basis to believe.

An inquiry into the work status of  women reveals some interesting insights which, too are consistent with the globalisation and employment nexus. Table-3 gives the work  status report of women, according to the categories of working in family farm business, employed by someone else, self employed and not worked in past 12 months etc.

Table : 3

Work Status

Percent distribution of ever-married women age 15-49 by  work status (figures represent NFHS-2 data and figures in brackets represent NFHS-1 data)

 Source : NFHS-1 and NFHS-2. 

It is clearly observed that Arunachal Pradesh has registered increases of 19.1 points in working in family farm/business, 0.2 points in  employed by someone else and a decline of 4.7 points in self employed categories respectively . For Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Nagaland, there is a overall increase of points in all categories ranging from 1.9 to 5.2.  It is further observed that the percentage of women not worked in past 12 months declined for all the states except Tripura. With the globalisation set in, the more employment opportunities are being created. As a result, women find scope for employment to get themselves absorbed . Here again, the rankings of the state, according to more opportunities of employment created during the past 12 months are as follows:-

Nagaland (20.4), Mizoram (16.7), Manipur (16.4) Arunachal Pradesh (14.7), Meghalaya (5.8) and Tripura  (-3.0)

Conclusions

If  the level of employment of ever-married women in the Northeastern states is juxtaposed upon the on-going globalisation process as reflected by the level of mass media exposure, it is found that a state which has wide coverage of mass media exposure, a proxy variable for the index of globalisation, is better placed in terms of women employment. Women  in the region (except Tripura) are found to have themselves engaged more in  their own family farm or business. Data from NFHS-1 and NFHS-2 also suggest that in spite of the growth of sectors of employed by someone else and self employed, their contributions in  providing employment for women in those areas are not worth to mention.

A comparative study of the two sets of data of NFHS-1 and NFHS-2, however, suggests that the impact of globalisation in employment generation for women in the Northeastern states is significantly substantial with a clear implication that more globalisation  entails higher level of employment.