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Companies in Zimbabwe are scaling up their response to HIV and AIDS by developing workplace policies and programmes that mitigate the impact of the pandemic on their businesses, employees and their families. Male and female workers, however, face different social and biological vulnerabilities to HIV and AIDS, and workplace environments can exacerbate their risks if companies do not take measures to mitigate them. It is increasingly recognised that addressing the gender dimensions of HIV and AIDS is crucial in any effort to halt the spread of infection.
Yet, although many companies in Zimbabwe now have HIV and AIDS programmes in place a gender perspective remains lacking. Most programmes appear to treat HIV and AIDS as a generic disease that affects women and men in the same way. In companies where considerations are given to women and men’s different interests and needs, these are generally made after all important decisions on goals and budgeting have been made. As a result most attention given to women has been in the form of components and add-ons, which has little influence on implementation of HIV and AIDS policies and programmes in the long term. In interventions that have successfully integrated gender in one aspect, discriminatory distinctions between men and women are made in another.

In order for programmes to be gender sensitive HIV interventions in the workplace must offer different services for women and men when their needs are different, but must also ensure that services do not treat women and men differently when their needs are the same. Mainstreaming gender into current HIV policies and programmes is therefore essential for increasing the coverage, effectiveness and efficiency of interventions.

In the next few weeks I will participate in conducting a baseline survey aimed towards identifying what the gender-differentiated vulnerabilities and risks are within six HIV and AIDS workplace programmes in Zimbabwe. Findings of the survey will inform future HIV and AIDS workplace programmes.