Threads of Constraint: Ethnic Minority Migrant Women and Employment‪.‬

INTRODUCTION Historically New Zealand (NZ) is a country of immigrants though these immigrants in the 19th and early 20th century were primarily Caucasians from Anglo Saxon countries. However, in the 19th century, there were a few migrants from China who came to NZ to work in the gold mines of Otago, as well as Indians who found employment as scrub cutters, fruit and vegetable hawkers in various parts of NZ and as servants of wealthy British settlers (Pio 2008). Census records of Indians in NZ show their increasing numbers thus: in 1881, six were recorded, in 1991 there were 30,609, and in 2006 there were 104, 583 Indians (Census 2006, Pio 2008). Similarly, Asians, (who include for example Indians and Chinese) show a growth in numbers in NZ as evidenced by census records: three per cent of the population in 1991, five per cent in 1996, 6.6 per cent in 2001, and 9.2 per cent in 2006. In the early and mid twentieth century, those ethnic minority women who worked primarily did so in family businesses such as market gardens and corner stores (Pio 2008). Nevertheless, in the current century, employed ethnic minority women in employment include: bank workers, call centre operators, care givers, check out operators in supermarkets, doctors, librarians, nurses, pharmacists, teachers and teaching aides.