Which activities are considered employment and work is far from straightforward as illustrated by the periodic changes adopted by the International Conference of Labour Statisticians (ICLS) in 2008 and 2013.<sup>6</sup> There is an important distinction between work and employment (Annex 1 details the ICLS 19 categories of work). The currently accepted international definition of employed people is “all those of working age who, during a short reference period, were engaged in any activity to produce goods or provide services for pay or profit in cash or in kind” (ICLS 19).<sup>7</sup> It is important to note that the threshold for inclusion in terms of amount of time spent working is very low: one only needs to have worked in this type of activity for one hour during the reference period to be considered employed.<sup>8</sup> The phrase “for pay or profit in cash or in kind” is critical, as it excludes activities that were previously included in the definition of employment, including activities for own-consumption.

This definition of employment is relatively new and has not yet been fully operationalized. Rather, as of 2019, most countries’ labor force statistics are based on the previous definition of employment (ICLS 13) which, in addition to work “for pay or profit”, included production activities for own-consumption such as subsistence agriculture as well as volunteer work. Within this definition, family members who work on the family farm were included as unpaid workers. In other words, under ICLS 13, all working age people engaging in at least one hour of work for monetary remuneration (pay or profit) or to generate goods for own-consumption are considered employed. Both the ICLS 13 and ICLS 19 definitions are considered for the purposes of this study as it was undertaken during a period in which Honduras was making the transition between the two.

In general, women are more likely to be involved in informal or irregular activities for pay or profit (e.g., economic activities performed at home or in the street such as making, selling products or preparing food for sale, washing, doing the laundry or doing the cleaning for another household for pay, animal husbandry, etc.) than men. Because of this, the difficulty in measuring these types of economic engagements has a larger effect on the quality of measurement of women’s activities (Chen 2001). Significant evidence shows that women’s engagement in agriculture and in the informal sector is undercounted (Dixon 1982; Charmes 1998; Bajaj 1999; Chen, Sebstad and O’Connell 1999; Mehra and Gammage 1999; Standing 1999; Carr, Chen, and Tate 2000; Chen 2001; Carr and Chen 2002; Muller 2002; and Chen 2004; Koolwal 2019).

Earlier work in Honduras shows that women combine several types of work including producing staple foods, selling food, and seasonal paid work especially in the agro-export sector such as in coffee and banana plantations (SAG 2000). And earlier analysis has found evidence of women’s work being undercounted in rural Honduras (De Leon et al. 1987; SAG 2000; Irias 2013; Fordham et al. 1985; Campillo 1993; Mayogra and Martinez 1996). Dewalt et al. (1985) and Colverson (1995), for example, find that low labor force participation rates among Honduran women are due, in part, to the underreporting of women’s involvement in agricultural production and food processing and distribution. Specifically, Honduran women were found to underreport their engagement in the following activities: Food 6 The ICLS meets approximately every five years to recommend best practices on methodological procedures (i.e. concepts, definitions, classifications) with the goal of promoting internationally comparable labor statistics and comparability across time within a country. The 18<sup>th</sup> ICLS was in 2008 and 19<sup>th</sup> ICLS was in 2013. 7 19th International Conference of Labour Statisticians (ICLS 19).

8 According to the ICLS 19, employment includes all persons who worked for pay or profit: while on training or skillsenhancement activities required by the job; apprentices; through employment promotion programs; people who work in their own economic units to produce goods for sale or barter; persons with seasonal jobs during the off season if they continue to perform some tasks or duties of the job; persons who work for pay or profit payable to the household or family; regular members of the armed forces and persons on military or alternative civilian service.

4