Gender, wages and globalisation of production in developing countries

This dissertation focuses on the relationship of trade wages and gender. Specifically it examines the impact of trade on wage disparities and its implication in terms of gender. Three country-cases were selected for this purpose. The case of Peru explores the impact of trade on wages taking into account the regional dimension. The cases of Guatemala and Indonesia concentrate more on the gender wage's effects of export-led growth as both countries participate into fragmented chains of production such garments. Additionally, a cross-country study examines to what extent four Latin American economies are involved into global chain of production.;The evidence of Peru depicts that trade liberalization has slightly contributed to increase wage inequality across Peruvian regions while education and informality have remained as the major contributors. These findings can be explained somehow by the simultaneously deregulation of the labour legislation that accompanied the trade liberalization reform and the lack of an education policy to facilitate the reintegration of the unemployed.;The evidence of Guatemala and Indonesia suggests that fragmentation impact differently depending on the institutional framework. The findings lend support to those advocating that the growth of export-oriented industries benefits workers as they get higher wages. These results are encouraging, however, this does not imply that worker's welfare improve overall. As the case of Guatemala shows, the existence of a weak institutional framework lead to perpetuate the gender wage gap and the detriment of working conditions. On the contrary, the existence of an adequate institutional framework as in the case of Indonesia provides the preconditions (e.g. law enforcement, education) to reduce the gender wage gap. Moreover, the insertion into fragmented chains of production based on cheap labour placed countries such Guatemala in a risky position as the competitiveness in low-skilled labour forced is significantly higher. This shed light on the importance of rethinking over the need of redirecting governments' efforts towards a more sustainable development strategy.