Lucknow: The Uttar Pradesh govt on Monday held a state-level consultation workshop to develop a “Care Economy” aimed at organised delivery of services for children, the elderly, persons with disabilities and others in need, while linking the sector with the organised service industry to expand employment opportunities.Social welfare minister Asim Arun said the initiative, with his department as the nodal agency, was designed to generate jobs and strengthen care and protection systems for elderly and disadvantaged groups across the state. He said the govt planned to build a structured care ecosystem by creating a skilled caregiver workforce through training and certification and by using digital technology to improve access and service delivery.The workshop was attended by representatives of 12 departments, including Health and Family Welfare, Women and Child Development, Labour, Skill Development, and Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities. Officials discussed aligning schemes and pooling resources under a shared strategy to give the care sector an organised framework. Deliberations also focused on skill training provisions and recognising informal care work as an economic activity.Key issues included assessing the economic value of domestic and informal care work to secure recognition and fair compensation; creating new employment and self-employment avenues for women; setting standardised training, certification and sustainable employment arrangements for caregivers; and exploring public-private partnership models, insurance mechanisms and the use of CSR funding to improve long-term financial viability of care services.Sanjeev Singh, director of the department of social welfare, termed the plan both a social necessity and a new employment domain, saying certification and training would improve service quality for families while expanding dignified livelihood options.
