Women in Thailand’s gem and jewellery industry and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): Empowerment or continued inequity?

Abstract

Thailand is a worldwide hub for the value addition of gemstones. Women in Thailand enjoy a high level of education, their employment level is on par with other member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and they play a significant role in the gem and jewellery industry. Thai institutions support the industry, but their gender-neutral stance does not celebrate, or capitalise on, the contribution of female actors. Patriarchy and ‘invisible masculinity’ underlie entrepreneurship across the country. A few privileged women have experienced a degree of empowerment and fair conditions at work. But some parts of the industry, for example, home-based work, are informal and women in the home-based gemstone-cutting industry in the border regions, hit particularly hard by COVID-19, have experienced little progress. The literature has not paid much attention to the Thai gem resource sector or to the contribution of women. This paper considers the gem and jewellery industry’s contribution to the lives of women in Thailand referencing the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)—gender equality and empowerment (SDG 5), decent work and economic work (SDG 8), and reduced inequalities (SDG 10). The paper is based on seven years of research into the opportunities and challenges for women in the gemstone value chain spanning Madagascar and Thailand. The paper questions the extent to which the industry has enabled and empowered women in Thailand, and whether it perpetuates some of the patterns of economic inequality reflected in, and caused by, the urban–rural divide.