Investigating Job Characteristics in Women Employment-Driven Migration at Regional-Level in Tanzania

Migration is a central demographic process in sub-Saharan Africa, reshaping population distribution and labor market dynamics. Historically, migration research emphasized male labor mobility, yet recent studies increasingly highlight the rising prominence and distinct dynamics of women’s migration, particularly in relation to employment opportunities and structural change. Within the framework of the MAPS Project, this paper contributes to filling this gap by investigating how the sectoral composition of women employment (alongside regional development contexts) correlates with spatial variation in women’s employment-driven migration across Tanzania. Data are drawn from the Tanzania Demographic and Health Surveys Program 2022. Within the women’s sample, 34.5% (n = 5,239) are inter-regional migrants, of which 13.9% (n = 728) report employment as their primary reason for migration. To capture spatial variation in employment-driven female migration, we estimate a Spatial Error Model using the regional percentage of employment-driven migrant women as outcome variable. Main explanatory variables describe the sectoral composition of female employment at the regional level (agriculture, manual, professional), controlling for regional measures of information access and household living conditions. Overall, the results indicate that women’s employment-driven migration is concentrated in regions with high shares of agricultural and manual employment, while professional employment does not appear to generate comparable migration incentives. Regions with better infrastructural and informational resources also tend to receive higher shares of employment-driven migrant women. These findings suggest that women’s employment-related mobility in Tanzania remains closely tied to structurally labor-intensive regional economies rather than to high-skill professional sectors.