Russia plans to further reduce the number of professions legally off-limits to women, officials said Tuesday, as the country looks for new ways to ease a worsening labor shortage driven by demographic decline, wartime recruitment and emigration.
The list of occupations prohibited for women has already been cut by more than fourfold in recent years, First Deputy Labor and Social Protection Minister Olga Batalina said at the Women of the North forum.
"Working conditions are changing thanks to digitalization and the introduction of safer production methods, so more professions that were once considered male are becoming professions for women," Batalina was quoted as saying by the state-run RIA Novosti news agency.
She added that Russia had recently appointed its first female freight locomotive driver.
Until recently, Russian law barred women from hundreds of jobs deemed too physically demanding or hazardous, based on concerns that they could harm women's reproductive health.
