Much of the economic activity undertaken by women in all societies is unmeasured and unpaid. This raises a conceptual problem concerning the definition of economic activity: the problem arises not just because much of women’s work produces no exchange value, since attempts are made to estimate the money value of certain non-marketed activities, such as the output of subsistence agriculture. In general, those activities concerned with the reproduction of the labour force, both on a daily and generational basis, are not counted as ‘economic activity’ if they are performed within the household on an unpaid basis. In Ethiopia, as in many underdeveloped countries, the reproduction of the labour force involves at least the following: the processing and preparation of food, water-carrying, fuel gathering and carrying, childbirth, child care and the care of adults; these are the unmeasured aspects of economic activity, and women performing them are frequently omitted from the category of ‘active labour force’.