NESIM AHMEDI

Kermanshah- Women face discrimination, inequality, harassment, violence and threats in the workforce. Women living in countries like Iran where women are restricted in public spaces bear the highest burden. Women struggling to survive the economic crisis suffered by the country are treated as second-class citizens just because of their gender.

Female street vendors in Eastern Park, a vicinity of Iran’s Kermanshah province, struggle to make ends meet for their families although they face harassment, oppression by government officials, and discriminatory approaches.

“I lost my father years ago,” said Amina, a 25-year-old female vendor. “Since then, my mother has come here to sell products on Friday. At the beginning, she came here alone but she was sexually harassed by male vendors. So me and my brother (14-year-old) decided to come with our mother so that no one would think she was alone. My mother is 53-year-old. When she is alone, she is harassed by male vendors but when my brother is with her, they do not harass her. Men in our society think that they have the right to harass a woman if she is alone.”

Discrimination, threats, inequality

Although female street vendors have smaller spaces than male vendors have, the municipal officers ask more fees from them. “For instance, they ask 20,000 tomans from men and they ask the same amount from us although we have smaller spaces. When I object to them, I am told ‘If you complain, you have to go’. We face discrimination, threats, and inequality because we are female street vendors.”