Employment among women with disabilities in Somalia: evidence from the Somali integrated household budget survey 2022

Women with disabilities in fragile and conflict-affected states face compounded disadvantages at the intersection of gender and disability. In the context of Somalia, empirical data concerning employment outcomes for this demographic remains critically scarce. This study examined the association between disability status and employment among women aged 15 years and above in Somalia, controlling for demographic, socioeconomic, and geographic factors. A cross-sectional design was applied using secondary data from the Somali Integrated Household Budget Survey (SIHBS 2022), designed to be nationally representative across 17 of Somalia’s 18 regions (Middle Juba excluded due to security challenges); the survey’s true cluster structure could not be fully reproduced in this analysis. The analytical cohort consisted of 12,162 women. Disability was evaluated according to the Washington Group Short Set (WG-SS) inclusive threshold (any domain score ≥ 2). Employment was operationalized in accordance with the ICLS-19 framework; the “not employed” category combines both unemployed and economically inactive women, as SIHBS 2022 does not permit this distinction for the full sample. Survey-weighted logistic regression analyses were conducted using R, estimating both unadjusted (Model 1) and adjusted (Model 2) models. The prevalence of disability within the sample was determined to be 11.7% (95% CI: 10.5–12.1%). The overall employment rate for women was found to be 12.2%. In the unadjusted model, women with disabilities exhibited non-significantly lower odds of employment (COR = 0.896; p = 0.326). After adjustment, disability status was significantly associated with lower employment odds (AOR = 0.678; 95% CI: 0.522–0.881; p = 0.004), corresponding to approximately 32% lower odds and a 3.44%-point lower predicted probability of employment (APE; 95% CI: −5.58 to − 1.28 pp). Age, educational attainment, marital status, and geographic region were the strongest correlates of employment. These inferences are conditional on a household-level approximation of the survey clustering. An adjusted association between disability and employment remained after accounting for structural factors, although precision depends on an approximated clustering structure. These findings support prioritizing disability-inclusive employment policies, improved educational access, and region-specific interventions to foster equitable participation in the labour market.