Representatives from national and international organizations have urged the government to ratify the ILO convention that aims to treat home-based workers in equal footing with other wage earners.

The statement issued after the conclusion of the two-day workshop on "Towards Securer Lives: Advocacy for Social Protection for Home Based workers in South Asia," held in Kathmandu said social security was an essential economic support to poor home-based workers, especially women.

The workshop organized by Home Net (HN) Nepal in partnership with Friedrich Ebert Stiftung (FES) India and Nepal office and Home Net South Asia (HNSA) also focused in developing an approach to designing social security program for home based workers in the region.

The workshop identified health, housing and credit facilities as the key priorities for social security.

Besides government and non-government sector representatives in Nepal, delegates from the HN in Bangladesh, India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka participated in the workshop. Also delegates from the International Labor Organization (ILO) and Global Labor Institute, Geneva participated in the program.

The participants also urged the authorities to adopt micro-insurance as one of the mechanism that could help the poor.

According to the organizers, at least 600 organizations with 550,000 home based workers have been organized in its network in South Asia.

All five South Asian countries are yet to ratify the ILO convention 177. "The activities of Nepal government and civil society suggest that Nepal might lead other countries by ratifying the convention first," said Samina Khan of HN Pakistan.

There are over 100 million home-based workers in the world, 50 million in South Asia and 2 million in Nepal, according to HNSA.