Written by Dhouha Djerbi, a Tunisian doctoral candidate, the article addresses the importance of implementing Decree No. 4 of 2024, which aims to establish a social protection program for women working in the agricultural sector. This protection includes economic inclusion, social security coverage, and ensuring women’s access to decent work. Maroua Ber-Regueb, a farm worker, traveled from Medenine to Tunis to present a manifesto to the Tunisian General Labor Union calling for the implementation of the decree, which had been celebrated by many women across the country. A 2023 study on the conditions of women working in the agricultural sector, a group comprising over 521,000 individuals according to 2017 statistics, revealed that 92 percent of respondents had no form of social security and instead faced exploitative conditions such as low wages, gender-based violence, and harsh working environments. Ber-Regueb recounts the dangers faced by uninsured women, including barriers to accessing proper healthcare in the event of work-related accidents, unsafe transportation to and from workplaces, and the lack of regulation surrounding pesticide exposure. Coverage for the program will be managed by the National Social Security Fund, to which most Tunisians contribute, while the state will cover or subsidize the contributions of women in the agricultural sector for the first three years. The women’s syndicate emphasized the significance of this decree for achieving food sovereignty in Tunisia.
