The status of women and their monetary and time contribution to development in viet nam a study in the periphery of ho chi minh city

The Status of Women and their Monetary and Time Contribution to Development in Viet Nam: A Study in the Periphery of Ho Chi Minh City* LUONGTHUTHUY University of Economics, Ho Chi M i City, Viet Nam WALTERE J TIPS Division of Human SettlementsDevelopment, Asian Institute of Technology, Bangkuk, Thailand ABSTRACT In this article the authors describe the main characteristics of women's life in the peripheral districts of Ho Chi Minh City, VietNam The status of women in VietNam is still an object of government eforts becausefull equality with men is not achieved yet Nevertheless, the contributions of women to development, both in time and money, are at least equal to men's contributions A linear correlaton can befound between a commune development index and the time contribution of women Cet article donne une description des caractiristiques de vie des femmes viehmmiennes dans la piriphe'rie de la ville de Ho Chi Minh La position desfemmes par rapport a celle des hornmes est telle que le gouvernement continue ses eforts en vue d'ame'liorer la situation et d'atteindre l'kgaliti totale Cependant les contributions desfemmes au diveloppement, qu'elles soient mesuries en termes monkfairesou en heures & travail, sont au mim kquivalentes a celles &s hommes Une corrilation lidaire pew ktre demontrke entre un index de diveloppement communal et les contributions desfemmes en heures de travail * This study has benefited from the comments of Dr H N Phien, Dr K E Weber, Mr H D Kammeier and two anonymous referees of this Journal Luong Thu Thuy gratefully acknowledges a Royal Belgian Government scholarship for M Sc studies at AIT The reseamh funds of the C a d i International Development Agency (CIDA) are gratefully acknowledged Walter E J Tips acknowledges his secondment to AIT by the Belgian Administration for Development Co-operation, Brussels CANADIAN JOURNAL OF DEVELOPMENT STUDIES INTRODUCTION In the latest Constitution of Viet Nam of 1980, women's right to equality with men is made concrete through provisions relating to the political, economic, cultural, social and familial aspects of daily life The Constitution stipulates the following in Article 63: The State and society concern themselves with the raising of the political, cultural, scientific, technical and professional level of women and must promote their role in society.' This advancement of women has received constant approval from public opinion, for traditionally, Vietnamese women have always played an active role in the community in all periods of national history In more than thrty years of struggle for national independence and for national construction many women have been promoted to leading roles in militant and later in state organizations The judicious policy pursued in this field by the Vietnamese Government, and the substantial efforts put in by women have resulted in the full utilization of the female workforce and the majority of women-workers are now in light Advancement of women is particularly industry, medicine, education and trading ~ervices.~ striking in the countryside since at the independence of North Viet Nam in 1954, 95 per cent of the peasants were itliterate At present, an increasing number of women managers of farming co-operatives, leaders of production groups, heads of breeding teams, technical teams and people's committees are leading members of their communities and continue working effectively for the improvement of their living standards Next to adopting appropriate legislation, inclusive of Constitutional rights, the Vietnamese Government has been stimulating the complete emancipation of women and the full development of their potential in everyday life This has created favourable conditions for women to translate the equality in law into equality in fact.3 The Viet Nam Women's Union, founded on 20 October 1946, which has active branches in every district and village, has as its main function to unite, educate, mobilize and organize all Vietnamese women in their activities for socialist conshuction of the country, for the emancipation and promotion of women and for the protection of women's and children's rights and interest^.^ Difficulties, however, still exist and there are many obstacles to women's participation in social development, especially in rural areas Over time and especially during the years of war, the percentage of women in leadership and management positions has started to rise But, because of the dual role of women in the household and in child care on the one hand, and in society through building up a career on the other hand, progress has been slow in establishing defacto equality in leading positions In spite of government efforts to further a more equitable distribution among the sexes, men have continued to dominate in public life As a result, while women comprise the majority of the collective agricultural workforce they remain a minority in co-operative management Women, aspiring to leadership positions especially in rural areas, must be comparatively wellqualified and knowledgeable about economic management, considered to be an essential skill during this period of national construction Increasing the percentage of women in rural co-operative leadership I 19, 18-20 Constitution of Viet Nam, (Hanoi Government of the Socialist Republic of Viet Nam, 1980) Census of 1979; the military are not included MAITHITu, "An important question for the advancement of women in Vietnam", V i e m Courier 1983 Ibid THE STATUS OF WOMEN IN VlET NAM 225 positions is one means of working towards maletfemale equality in the countryside, but, also in Viet Nam, women who seek entrance into fields which were until now predominantly reserved for men, are running into a kind of monopolistic spirit A certain conservative opinion does not readily accept that women in Viet Nam go into such men's careers as law, surgery or mechanical engineering Male resistance to loss of patriarchal authority and to the reversal of traditional authority relationships hampers women's participation in social activities The objective of this paper is to present recent data on the situation of women in Viet Narn and to explore the possible correlation between the status and the contribution of women to development No attempt is made to review the existing literature on socialist versus non-socialist countries in terms of women studies, nor is any methodological review of unpaid housework evaluation methods attempted I METHODOLOGY This study looks into the time and monetary contributionsof women to development relative to men's contributions within the framework of the family as an economic production unit It is hypothesized that various indicators of development would be correlated with the time contributionin productive efforts as well as with the money income of women Thus, on the basis of the wives' share in the total household income or in time spent on productive labour, one could look into whether the women partners in the household receive their fair share of returns from this economic production unit This could be tested by looking into the correlation of selected variables with a) the wife's relative monetary contribution excluding housework, and b) the wife's relative time contribution including housework These variables are (1) the level of commune development, (2) the wife's relative expenditure, (3) the wife's relative mobility, (4) the wife's equality in decision-making, (5) the wife's opinions towards equality, (6) the wife's relative participation in government While the wife's developmentprogram, and (7) the wife's relative participation in p~litics.~ stage in the life cycle clearly plays an important role, in this exploratory study, we have focused on married, middle-aged, mostly past child-bearing age, women only To test the hypotheses, the following parameters were studied: - the social status of the wife, through the use of equality indices, - women's attitudes to participation in socio-economic development such as attitudes towards equality, government program participation, job opportunities, decisionmaking, and economic contribution, - the correlation between equality, commune development indices and women's contribution (seethe Appendix) F; earlier work along this line, see amongst others: YONGMOYTANG,"The Position of Women and their Contribution to Rural Productive Efforts-A Case Study in Kedah, Malaysia," Division of Human Settlements Development, M.Sc Thesis no 1198, Bangkok, Asian Institute of Technology, 1976; TANKm YONG,"The Position of Women and their Contribution to Rural Productive Efforts: A Case Study of Chiang Mai, Thaihd",Division of Human Settlements Development, M.Sc Thesis no 1204, Bangkok, AlT, 1976; "The Role of Women in Rural Socio-Economic Development in Northern Samar, and ALMA C MANAOG, Philippines", Division of Human Settlements Development, M.Sc Thesis no 1213, Bangkok, Asian Institute of Technology, 1977 226 CANADIAN JOURNAL OF DEVELOPMENT STUDIES The calculation of index values was based on information collected through struc- tured, standardized interviews Obviously, if one wishes to quantify relative monetary and time contributions of women, a quantitative approach is unavoidable Nevertheless, qualitative observations can substantially supple&nt this collection of interviews Some such data obtained from observation and free interviews are reported also Fifty day-long observations, equally distributed over the surveyed districts, have been made The questionnaires comprise a large number of items or questions in the case of attitude testing (see the Appendix) Informationcollection was canied out on the household level in five "d" communes of the peripheral districts of Ho Chi Minh City These districts are Binh Chanh, Cu Chi, Hoc Mon, Nha Be and Thu Duc The inner city communes were not sampled because their different socio-economic composition would have introduced new uncontrolled variables The total sample size was two hundred and fifty households: fifty interviews were conducted in each of the five communes The women were interviewed by simple random sampling on the basis of the official registration cards The survey was conducted during May-June 1984 11 DESCRIPTION OF THE STUDY AREA Ho Chi Minh City, the largest city of Viet Nam, extends over an area of 2,029 square kms with eighteen districts, comprising twelve inner-city districts and six sub-urban, predominantly rural, districts For reasons of homogeneity and lack of time only five of the six suburban districts were chosen to be surveyed In comparison with the twelve innercity districts, the six suburban districts cover 92.6 per cent of the area of the whole city The suburban districts are comparatively sparsely populated with an average density of approximately seven hundred persons per square km for the five sampled districts In these predominantly rural peripheral areas, many problems need to be solved to help the majority of comparatively poor, less-educated people especially rural women Many facilities are lacking and the distance to government aid centers is relatively large In Viet Nam and in Ho Chi Minh City, the main economic activities are agriculture, aquaculture and, small scale light industry and commerce Due to several factors (such as the reclamation of waste land, the putting into production of all available land, the expansion of the areas under winter crops, the improvement of the irrigation system, and the application of new seed varieties and technology), suburban agriculture has increased the officially recorded paddy output from 95,000 tons in 1975 to 200,000 tons in 1981 With more than 10,000 of planting area, the vegetable output in 1981 was 168,000 tons, an increase of 21.9 per cent in comparison with 1980 In Ho Chi Minh City, there are four state farms with 12,694 ha, taking the main role in the agricultural economy, ten production co-operatives and three hundred and fifty product groups involving one fifth of the total households and one tenth of the cultivated land Its output value amounts to about six per cent of the total value of the city's output Light industry (such as weaving baskets, mats, blankets and towels; making soap, ready-to-wear clothes, tobacco, manual equipment and small machines for agricultural production) is being developed as an attempt to solve the unemployment problem Table shows the quantitative pattern of major land use in the City by 1981 We have constructed a (commune) development index based on the availability of various services such as electricity, piped water, inigation canals, primary schools, health centers, and access roads, in order to compare the districts' development The values of 227 THE STATUS OF WOMEN IN VlET NAM Table Quantitative Pattern of Major Land Uses in Ho Chi Minh City, 1981 Land Use Percentage Agriculture Residential Use Industry Commerce Administration Cultural uses Scenic Areas and Open Spaces Source: City Planning Committee of Ho Chi Minh City, 1981 the development index for the five sampled districts are as follows: Binh Chan: 0.20; Cu Chi: 0.11; Hoc Mon: 0.14; Nha be: 0.17; and Thu Duc: 0.17 Table shows the distribution of residential utilities as an indicator of development Table Percentage Distribution of Access to Utilities Provided to Households Districts Sampled Utilities BinhChanh CuChi Hoc Mon NhaBe ThuDuc Five Districts 40 82 0 78 96 88 98 62 66 22 28 72 16 42 27 77 47 Piped Water Electricity Communal Stand-Pipe Well Source: the Survey 111 VIETNAMESE WOMEN TODAY Women play an important role in the economy of the country and of the city Table gives an indication of the female labor force in various fields of activities that may be considered more advanced Women play, of course, a very important role in the agricultural sector of Viet Nam Among the women in the sample, there are eight per cent who are farmers in Binh Chan, thirty-six per cent in Cu Chi, thirty-four per cent in Hoc Mon, fourteen per cent in Nha Be and twenty-two per cent in Thu Duc district A Age and Education The mean ages of wife and husband in the sample are thuty-six and thuty-nine years respectively The age of the majority of the wives (seventy per cent) lies between 21-40 years, while the husband's (sixty-one per cent) lies between 1-50 For sixty per cent of the surveyed households, the husband is older than the wife by at least one to ten years 228 CANADIAN JOURNAL OF DEVELOPMENT STUDIES Table Percentage of the Female Labor Force in some Principal Economic Sectors Economic Sector Female Labor Force Ho Chi Minh City Vietnam Light Industry Handicrafts State Trading Service Public Health Education % % % % % 54.5 65.0 70.0 85.0 64.0 63.0 73.2 61.5 72.6 60.0 Source: City Planning Committee of Ho Chi Minh City, 1979 Only eight per cent of the wives have received no education at all But, none of the men are in this group Fifty per cent of the Vietnamese wives and thirty-nine per cent of the husbands have received from one to five years of primary school education For school attendance in the six to twelve year group, men have a clear dominance with fifty-eight per cent as against forty-eight per cent among women Our study reveals that women around thirty years who are now living in predominantly rural areas, did not get much education when they were young, due to a lack of opportunities The situation nowaday has considerably changed More rural young girls receive higher education than their mothers and older sisters received In general, the husband is more educated than the wife B Opinion on Job Opportunities For the two questions asked, a) "When competing for the same job, who will get the job first?' and b) "When job opportunities are not sufficient, who will get hired lint?", over sixty per cent of the wives think that mostly or only men will, eighteen per cent think women and men have equal chances and ten per cent think women can get the job first Only nine per cent believe the kind of job will determine opportunity for women In general, sixty-three per cent of the respondents believe men will get a job first The reasons are quite clearly understood: men always get higher education and are more available and mobile than women They are not burdened by household chores, or by taking care of children, and therefore are less likely to be absent from work than wives Although women respondents rationalize their smaller chances to obtain equal job opportunity on material grounds, they obviously display attitudes that reflect desires to get godd jobs as men get C Property Ownership In the sample, forty-eight per cent of the wives have equal property to their husbands, twenty-five per cent of them have more property than their husbands, and twenty per cent less, six per cent of the wives possess all the property in the family as compared to less than one per cent of the husbands The index includes everything that wives and husbands possess and, therefore, it may be a good indicator Quite frequently, wives' earnings are additional to their household duties, and these earnings can be converted into modest THE STATUS OF WOMEN 1N VIET NAM 229 possessions such as furniture, appliances, and jewelry Men usually spend more on coffee, cigarettes, and liquor and possess little personal property of the kind women own To assess who is the main decision-maker in the family, fifteen questions related to family issues were asked (see Table 4) Results show that in fifty-eight per cent of the surveyed households, both wives and husbands are decision-makers; in fifteen per cent "mostly wife" and in twelve per cent "wife only" decisions prevail, while one per cent are "husband only" and twelve per cent are "mostly husband" decisions In comparison with their husbands, wives possess equal, or for some decisions even more, importance in family decision-making Wives are the main decision-makers concerning household needs and expenditures, whereas husbands get more priority in making decisions about the most important affairs such as buying a house, family occupation, moving to another place or hours of work In the case of Viet Narn, wives have more say about where to sell and for how much products should be sold because their husbands seem to trust their judgement in deciding about these affairs Also, the marketing of products is usually left to housewives E Attitudes Towards Equality For the sixteen questions related to what wives think about their equality, fifty-nine per cent of the wives agree and twenty-three per cent strongly agree on the statements expressing equality of women; 6.5 per cent disagree and ten per cent are neutral towards the achievement of equality with men (see Table 5) A considerable portion of wives still have inferiority feelings The highest percentages of agreement are found for items on the desirabiity of female offspring, equal education, participation in social activities, equality in ownership and decision-making F Participation in Government Development Programs In the sample, fifty-one per cent of the couples on average never participate and 33.5 per cent of the couples participate in several government programs On average 9.5 per cent of the answers fall in the "women only" category, with high percentages for household management and health and nutrition training Only five per cent of the answers are "men only" replies, with high scores for agricultural and vocational training programs The highest percentage of non-participating couples is recorded for agricultural training (81.6%), vocational training (75.6%), adult education classes (74.4%) and the lowest for family planning (13%) The highest percentages of both men and women participating, is for family planning (81.2%), health and nutrition (47.2%) and household management (46%) G Political Participation About 22.5 per cent of couples not and 50.7 per cent participate in six political items that have been scored The highest percentageof participation are recorded on items I, voting (99.6%); item 3, listening to the program introducing the election candidate (74%); item 2, attending regular meetings of the commune (59.6%), while the highest percentage Table Decision-making Index: Responses to Various Questions on "Who Decides in the Household?" Percentages Husband only Mostly husband Husband & wife Mostly wife Wife only No answer Household necessities Buying household utensils Buying a house Family occupation Moving to another place Stop quarreling within the household Hours of work in the field Where to sell the produce How much to sell Maniage of children Family planning When children start to work Making trips Which T.V or radio program to choose To go or not to go to meetings 0.4 0.4 0.4 1.2 0.4 3.2 2.4 0.8 0.4 0.0 0.4 0.8 0.8 0.8 1.6 9.2 4.8 15.2 14.8 16.8 18.8 26.8 14.8 15.6 3.2 1.6 6.4 9.6 6.0 20.4 25.6 28.0 76.4 77.2 76.4 18.4 54.8 33.2 34.4 89.6 77.6 81.6 72.4 72.0 57.2 34.4 39.6 3.6 4.0 3.2 39.2 9.2 24.8 23.2 2.8 4.8 6.8 10.0 10.8 10.4 30.4 27.2 4.0 2.0 2.4 15.2 4.8 24.0 24.4 2.0 10.4 2.4 6.0 10.0 10.0 0.0 0.0 0.4 0.8 0.8 5.2 2.0 2.4 2.0 2.4 5.2 2.0 1.2 0.4 0.4 Unweighted average 0.9 12.3 58.3 15.1 11.7 1.7 Items Table Anitude Index: Women's Altitudes about Women's Stahls Items Strongly disagree Disagree Percentages Neutral Agree Strongly agree No answer 0.2 6.5 10.2 59.1 23.7 0.2 Women are as physically strong as men Women are as smart as men Women have equal responsibility to men Women are as hard working as men Women are as skilled as men Women can drive as well as men Women can understand politics as well as men Women can be equal politicians to men Women can know about medecine as well as men Women should have the same salaries for equal work Women should make decisions in all affairs as men Women nowadays should receive equal education as men Women should have rights to own property Women want to migrate to the city as men Daughters are as favorable as sons Women want to participate in social activities as men Unweighted average 232 CANADIAN JOURNAL OF DEVELOPMENT STUDIES of both women and men never participating fall on items and (42%),going to meetings outside the commune and revealing opinions to the headman about commune development H Mobility With respect to mobility, wives have an equal opportunity to travel, however wives and husbands seldom travel together or stay for a long period Most go to their native towns for social visits for a day or two, at most I Personal Expenditure About 62.8 per cent of the respondents spend from zero to forty per cent of the husband and wife's expenditure, only thirty-four per cent of the wives spend from fortyone to sixty per cent of the share The majority of the wives spend less than their husbands because cigarettes, liquor, and coffee account for a large portion of the husband's expenses J The Relative Contribution of the Wife in the Household It must be noted that the discussion here is based on the wife and husband only, excluding other contributing household members All labour has been included, even though some activities may not normally be considered to be work Observation of some fifty households-ten in each surveyed district-has made it possible to obtain an accurate picture of daily activities The major occupational categories have been listed in Table The proportion of women with sideline income reaches forty-four per cent for the whole sample, with great variability among the sampled districts from seventy per cent in Cu Chi to twenty-six per cent in Nha Be district Wives can also involve themselves in the private sector or breed animals that produces additional income Table Percentage Distribution of Main Women's Occupations in Five Dishicts of Ho Chi Minh City Districts Sampled Occupations Artisan Cadre Farmer Hairdresser Housewife Nurse Tailoress Teacher Trader Worker * without sideline Binh Chanh Cu Chi Hoc Mon Nha Be Thu DUC % % % % % THE STATUS OF WOMEN IN VIET NAM 233 The average number of working hours for a wife and husband including housework are 9.5 hourslday and 7.5 hourslday respectively, and excluding housework it is 6.5 and 7.3 h o d d a y If we include housework, wives work more than their husbands by two hours per day and if we exclude housework, wives work forty minutes less on average than their husbands Among the five sampled districts, there is not much difference, except in Nha Be where the highest number of working hours including housework-12.3 h o d d a y for the wife and 9.5 h o d d a y for the husband-or excluding housework-8.5 h o d d a y and 9.1 hourslday respectively-is found Vietnamese wives, besides working in the offices or in the fields, must housework by themselves and very seldom husbands help their wives with these chores The wives' relative monetary contribution to the household income, including their housework, is 56.7 per cent; excluding housework, the contribution of wives is 50.9 per cent of the total household income The relative time contribution of the wife including housework, accounts for fifty-six per cent and, excluding housework, it accounts for fortysix per cent of the total household working hours This means that the wife's contribution, in terms of time (excluding housework), is comparatively smaller, but, still contributes half of the family budget In terms of time (including housework), certainly wives' contributions are comparatively larger than their husbands, but there is not much difference between wives' monetary contribution (including housework or excluding housework), because the domestic wages used to calculate this contribution are extremely low in comparison with the earnings from wdrking outside the household The social value of wives' time contribution by far exceeds the market value of their household activities If we exclude housework, 33.6 per cent of the wives in terms of money and 24 per cent in terms of time, contribute less than their husbands But, if we include housework, only 22.4 per cent of the wives in terms of money, and 4.8 per cent in terms of time contribute less than their husbands IV STATUS AND CONTRIBUTION OF WOMEN To summarize, the percentage distributions of the nine equality indices are shown in Table The hypotheses test whether there is any correlation between the time and monetary contribution of women on the one hand and various indicators of women's status on the other hand The correlation coefficients have been calculated for each district as well as for the entire sample, and are summarized in Table If we adopt the five per cent level of significance, there is only one significant correlation namely that the commune development index correlates with the time contribution of women This correlation suggests that further investments of women's time in the development of their commune could improve its standard of living, although a cause-effect relationship is not easily seen on a practical level Nevertheless, the emphasis is on self-help, and, furthermore, the items scored-most notably water supply system availability-figure high on the list of desirable utilities for the household Two correlations were found for separate districts In Cu Chi district, there is a correlation between wives' relative participation in government development programs and wives' relative monetary contribution excluding housework We can speculate on reasons for finding this correlation In Cu Chi, the northwestern gate of the City, the revolutionary forces operated in the recent war, through its famous undergmund passage All the families CANADIAN JOURNAL OF DEVELOPMENT STUDIES THE STATUS OF WOMEN IN VIET NAM 235 Table Correlation Coefficients between Women's Position and their Contribution in Time and Money CorrelationCoefficients Variables Monetary Time Development Index Personal Expenditure Index Mobility Index Decision-making Index Attitude Index Government Program Participation Index Political Participation Index * significant at the 5% level (Table All, G.W Snedecor & W.G Cochran, 1967, Statistical Methods, Ames, Iowa State University Press) there contributed either human or financial resources during wartime Cu Chi women have been recognized as the most militant in carrying out government policies In peacetime, with the objective of partially cbmpensating the population of Cu Chi for their sufferings, government development programs such as family planning, adult education classes, vocational training, agricultural training, health and nutrition, household management and co-operative organizations were launched in this district on a large scale Furthermore, in comparison with the four other districts, none of the respondents is a housewife only, all women have their own careers and many of them have a sideline In addition to household work and their main careers, women devote their time to pig raising, poultry, cows or planting rice The highest percentage of wives' occupations with sidelines occurs in Cu Chi district (70%) The more women involve themselves in these government development programs, the more opportunities they have to make money and vice versa In Hoc Mon district, there is a correlation between wives' relative mobility and wives' relative monetary contribution excluding housework After Cu Chi, Hoc Mon district has the lowest percentage of full-time housewives (2%) The majority of the wives' occupations are government cadre (36%), teacher ( 10%) and labourer (I 0%) In general, 98 per cent of the wives have their own careers and many of them have a sideline (42%) (see Table 6) Due to their career, Hoc Mon women travel a lot more outside their commune; the mean days of wives' mobility (57 dayslyear) is the highest among the five districts surveyed CONCLUSION The results reveal the existing constraints on middle-aged, married women as well as on men The majority of women work harder than men because in addition to outside work they must housework and 44.4 per cent of them also have an additional income Women contribute half of the family budget and their time contribution to the household productive efforts is larger than men's The majority of wives participate as much as their husbands in development programs and are the co-decision-makers in family affairs In spite of these facts, they spend less than their husbands and the social prejudice favours men when applying for a job Also, some important decisions are still mostly made by men 236 CANADIAN JOURNAL OF DEVELOPMENT STUDIES Even though more than fifty per cent of the wives get the same education as their husbands, it remains that the educational level of the couple in peripheral areas of the city needs to be upgraded The same situation also applies to the mobility of wife and husband, neither of whom travels for extended periods The highest percentage of both men and women participating in government programs are for family planning (81.2%), health and nutrition (47.2%), and household management (46%): nevertheless the implementation of these programs should be speeded up The percentage of non-participating husbands and wives is high in regard to adult education classes (74.4%), vocational training (75.6%), and agricultural training (81.6%) In terms of how well women are doing as compared to their inputs or contributions to development, it is perhaps significant that the development index comlates with the time contribution of women However, it seems that such time expenditure is not directly related to higher incomes at the household level Some previous studies in Thailand, Malaysia and the Philippines have proven the relative weakness of establishing simple linear correlations to measure whether women receive their fair share from development return^.^ On the basis of the information collected and some of the lacunae observed, some policy considerations can be put forward There seems to be very little use for some of the present efforts in providing training to improve production Although there is a need to provide remunerated opportunities for work, it is obvious that at present, training programs figure low in priority when competing for the attention of the women in the periphery of Ho Chi Minh City From the relatively active role and better status of women employed outside the household one can derive a need to provide facilities such as kindergartens, which enable women to take up careers and thus enhance their consciousness about careers outside the home One should be supportive of the role of the Viet Nam Women's Union in order that not only women from war-tom Cu Chi, but all Vietnamese women, derive courage from the past to further peaceful development and progress in the future APPENDIX The following variables were constructed a indicators of equality composite development, and wives' relative contribution I EQUALITY INDICES The equality indices express the wife's share a5 a percentage of the total of both the husband's and wife's shares This was measured by the amount of money spent annually on items which are for the sole use of the wife or the husband The following items were recorded: -Wife: clothing, footwear permanent wave and haircut, cosmetics, toilet set, handbag, hat, books and magazines, entertainment, sportive recreation, coffee other item for personal use; -Husband: clothing footwear, haircut, cigarmes, coffee, liquor, books and magazines, newspapers, entertainment, sportive activities, lottery Yong Moy Tang op