Kobylkin: Reindeer herders’ wives to receive a salary starting in 2018
© RIA Novosti. Evgeniy Biyatov

Kobylkin: Reindeer herders’ wives to receive a salary starting in 2018

The profession of rawhide tent keeper (a reindeer herder's wife, the housekeeper in the tent) has been added to the list of jobs in Russia. Female tundra workers will start receiving a salary starting in 2018, TASS reports Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Area Governor Dmitry Kobylkin as saying at the 5th international Arctic legal forum, Protection and Sustainable Development of the Arctic: Legal Aspects.

"The job of a rawhide tent keeper has been approved. The women will be paid a salary from the beginning of the new year," said Kobylkin.

TASS mentions that the administration of the Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Area repeatedly raised the issue of the role of women in reindeer herding. Female rawhide tent keepers used to be registered as reindeer herders, 3rd category, which neither reflected all their duties nor fully ensured their rights.

"Everything rests on local women. Nearly every rawhide tent keeper is also a mother of many children. Statistically speaking, most of the multi-child families are indigenous ones. They give birth to the highest number of babies," added Kobylkin.

Russia is home to 41 small indigenous peoples of the North, Siberia and the Far East whose population totals about 250,000. Over half of them live in the Arctic. The Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Area is home to 42,000 representatives of native peoples of the North — the Nenets, Khanty and Sekulpy.