Fizza Batool, CASAS’ member, has published with Rabia Nadir, Huda Javaid, Munir Ghazanfar, Soha Bashir & Huma Naeem an article in Geographien Südasiens.
Abstract: This essay is based on the findings of a research started in 2018 to interrogate the rising number of rural migrant women working as maids in middle class homes in the metropolitan city of Lahore in Punjab, Pakistan. Rural–to-urban migration is an ongoing process in developing countries and the rate of urban growth in Pakistan surpasses its neighbors in South Asia. The Green Revolution (GR) in the mid1960s introduced mechanization as well as synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, and transformed the agrarian mode of production in Punjab. Our study aims to investigate the conditions in rural Punjab forcing women to seek employment as domestic help in the city. This research was conducted in the city of Lahore and some 25 villages across Punjab, a vast region with diverse agro-ecological zones. Most of the villages were in central Punjab, which is more developed and is dominated by small land holdings, fewer interviews were conducted in the south. The research methodology was qualitative interviews, and focus group discussions with maids in Lahore and a range of rural actors in villages. In the city, we recorded and transcribed detailed interviews with maids who had migrated in the last 10-15 years to Lahore city and held three focus group discussions in working class neighborhoods. In addition, we interviewed representatives of a non-government organization working to unionise domestic workers in Lahore. In the villages, we conducted interviews with landless peasants, farm labourers, rich and middle farmers, local health professionals, agricultural department personnel and school teachers. The wide range of interviews aimed to understand the social and ecological conditions of the sending village environment of the maids in the city.
Read their full article here: https://doi.org/10.11588/hasp.1364
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Mercedes Ejarque
Mercedes Ejarque is a researcher at the National Institute of Agricultural Technology (INTA). She is also Professor of Rural Sociology in a Master Program at the University of Buenos Aires (UBA). She holds a Master’s Degree in Social Research and a PhD in Social Sciences from the University of Buenos Aires. Her research focuses on society – nature relations around agrarian activities, social constructivism of environmental problems and political ecology in Patagonia. She has also published about methodological issues in agrarian research, rural labour markets and rural-urban tendencies.