against child labour12 june 2002 · no. 43, june 2002 international labour office against child...

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World of Work magazine is publishedfour times per year by the Departmentof Communication of the ILO in Gen-eva. Also published in Chinese, Czech,Danish, Finnish, French, German,Hindi, Hungarian, Japanese, Norwe-gian, Russian, Slovak, Spanish andSwedish.

EDITOR

Thomas NetterGERMAN EDITION

Hans von RohlandARABIC EDITION

Khawla Mattar, ILO Office, BeirutSPANISH EDITION

In collaboration with the ILO Office,MadridPRODUCTION MANAGER

Kiran Mehra-KerpelmanART DIRECTION

Paprika, Annecy, FranceCOVER DESIGN

PaprikaEDITORIAL ASSISTANT

Mat Coakley

This magazine is not an official docu-ment of the International LabourOrganization. The opinions expresseddo not necessarily reflect the views ofthe ILO. The designations employed donot imply the expression of any opin-ion whatsoever on the part of the ILOconcerning the legal status of anycountry, area or territory or of itsauthorities, or concerning the delimita-tion of its frontiers.Reference to names of firms and com-mercial products and processes doesnot imply their endorsement by theILO, and any failure to mention a par-ticular firm, commercial product orprocess is not a sign of disapproval.Texts and photographs may be freelyreproduced with mention of source(except photo agency photographs).Written notification is appreciated.All correspondence should be addressedto the ILO Department of Communica-tion, CH-1211 Geneva 22, Switzerland.Tel. +4122/799-7912Fax +4122/799-8577http://www.ilo.org/communication

Readers in the US should send theircorrespondence to the InternationalLabor Office, Washington Branch, 1828L Street, NW, Suite 801, Washington,DC 20036.Tel: +202/653-7652Fax: +202/653-7687Printed by SRO-Kundig SA, GenevaISSN 1020-0010

WorkT h e W O R L D O F

WorkT H E M A G A Z I N E O F T H E I L O

Preparations for an evacuation of theILO from Europe began with the 1938Munich crisis, and by the spring of 1940 itbecame clear that Switzerland could nolonger be a base for the ILO. In the summerof that year, then Director-General JohnWinant, moved rapidly to get 50 or so corestaff and a large number of tin boxes ofpapers to Montreal, where they wouldremain until 1948. (Winant was one of thelast to go, slipping into Spain by a backroad two days after Franco had closed thefrontier to League of Nations and ILO staffat the request of Hitler.)

Following discussions with Prime MinisterMackensie King, Winant accepted the offerof space at McGill University because, itseems, he thought the ILO would be most athome in bilingual, international Montreal.His deputy and successor in 1941, EdwardPhelan, and his legal adviser (and subse-quent ILO Director-General) WilfredJenks, arrived shortly after he and the staffwere installed in a disused chapel.

Although a belligerent, Canada went toextraordinary lengths to ensure that theILO could carry on the work of an inde-pendent multilateral organization. McGillspent $25,000, a sum it could scarcelyafford at the time, converting buildings forILO use. When gradually the ILO’s financesrecovered later in the war, Phelan offered to

pay $5,000 a year in rent by way of reim-bursement.

McGill proved to be much more than atemporary hostel and warehouse for theILO. Although contacts with governments,unions and employers were often difficult,the ILO continued to issue its quarterlyjournal and published several valuablepieces of research. It was also the hub of aremarkable whirl of diplomatic activity.

From the moment of their arrival inCanada, Winant, Phelan and Jenks workedclosely with Allied leaders to position theILO as a key player in post-war reconstruc-tion. Their work resulted in the adoption ofa Declaration at the International LabourConference held in 1944 in Philadelphia,Pennsylvania, which established a new sys-tem for securing peace through economicand social development.

Today, the words of the PhiladelphiaDeclaration are as relevant as they werethen: “All human beings, irrespective ofrace, creed or sex, have the right to pursueboth their material well-being and theirspiritual development in conditions offreedom and dignity, of economic securityand equal opportunity; the attainment ofthe conditions in which this shall be possi-ble must constitute the central aim ofnational and international policy.”

Canada and the ILO

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Message from Juan Somavia,ILO Director-General

Planet Work

News

• World Commission on the Social Dimension of

Globalization meets

• Workers’ Memorial Day ceremony

• Violence in the workplace threatens health services

• ILO verdict on working conditions in the

Cambodian garment industry

• Monterrey: Developing ideas to tackle poverty

• Governing Body holds 283rd Session

Around the Continents

ILO in the Press

Media Shelf

F E A T U R E S

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ILO in Cambodia: Ten years after

Mobbing – New scourge among union members?

In India, an industry works to retain its shine

East Timor: A new labour code for a new country

F O C U S : C H I L D L A B O U R

Cover story: Child Labour remains “massive problem”

Scream against child labour

UN family unites to counter child trafficking

ILO and Inter-Parliamentary Union

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Created in 1919, the International Labour Organization (ILO) brings together governments, employers and workers of its 175 member States in commonaction to improve social protection and conditions of life and work throughout the world. The International Labour Office, in Geneva, is the permanentSecretariat of the Organization.

G E N E R A L A R T I C L E S

This year, on June 12th, the International Labour Orga-

nization will observe the first World Day Against Child

Labour.

Join us in working towards a world where no chil-

dren will be deprived of a normal, healthy childhood,

where parents can find decent jobs and children go to

school. Help us to spread the message for a world free

from child labour.

Families and communities, schools, workers, busi-

ness, governments, the media – all can play a part in

promoting the right of every child to be protected from

hazardous, dangerous work and exploitation.

Let us look forward to the day when we will no

longer need a World Day Against Child Labour.

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Child labour remains “ma

I L O G L O B A L R E P O R T

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en years after launching a worldwidecampaign against child labour, theInternational Labour Office (ILO)has launched a comprehensive newlook at the problem. The findings are

cause for concern; despite “significant progress”in efforts to abolish child labour, the report saysan alarming number of children remain trappedin its worst forms. These and other issues willtop the discussion at the International LabourConference in June as well as the launch of thefirst World Day Against Child Labour

GENEVA – “A Future Without Child Labour”,1

the ILO’s most comprehensive study on the sub-ject to date, notes that there has been a world-wide response to calls for abolishing childlabour, especially in its worst forms, throughdirect action at the local, national and interna-tional levels. However, child labour remains a

problem on a massive scale, according to Direc-tor-General Juan Somavia, who is calling for aredoubling of efforts to fight the practice.

Among the key findings:• One in every six children aged 5 to 17 – or 246

million children – are involved in child labour.• One in every eight children in the world –

some 179 million children aged 5 to17 – is stillexposed to the worst forms of child labour,which endangers his physical, mental or moralwell-being.

• About 111 million in hazardous work, areunder 15, and should be “immediately with-drawn from this work”.

• An additional 59 million youths aged 15 to17should receive urgent and immediate protec-tion from hazards at work, or be withdrawnfrom such work.

• Some 8.4 million children are caught in


T

CHILD LABOUR continues to be a

global phenomenon –no country or region is

immune.

S C R E A M T R A F F I C K I N G I P U

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WORLD OF WORK, NO. 43, JUNE 2002

“unconditional” worst forms of child labour,including slavery, trafficking, debt bondageand other forms of forced labour, forcedrecruitment for armed conflict, prostitution,pornography, and other illicit activities.

• Child labour continues to be a global phe-nomenon – no country or region is immune,the report says. A wide range of crises –including natural disasters, sharp economicdownturns, the HIV/AIDS pandemic, andarmed conflicts – increasingly draw theyoung into debilitating child labour, includ-ing illegal and clandestine forms such asprostitution, drug trafficking, pornography,and other illicit activities.

The report was produced as part of the follow-up to the 1998 ILO Declaration on FundamentalPrinciples and Rights at Work. The Declarationreaffirmed the commitment of all ILO memberStates to respect, promote, and realize the rightsof workers and employers to freedom of associ-ation and collective bargaining, and to be freefrom forced or compulsory labour, child labour,and discrimination.

Has the number of child labourers increasedor decreased? The figures in the new report dif-fer from the previously accepted estimate ofsome 250 million working children aged 5 to14in developing countries – the best estimate pos-sible in 1996, when it was first produced. Thereport notes that the latest methods of gatheringdata provide a more precise picture of the prob-lem of child labour, its distribution amongregions and between age groups, and thereforeprovide figures that are not open to simple com-parison with the original estimate.

THE SHAPE OF THE PROBLEMThe report describes child labour at the start

of the twenty-first century as “endlessly variedand infinitely volatile”. Drawing on recent surveydata, it says an estimated 352 million childrenaged 5 to 17 are currently engaged in economicactivity of some kind.

Of these, some 106 million are engaged intypes of work acceptable for children who havereached the minimum age for employment(usually 15 years) or in light work, such ashousehold chores or work undertaken as part ofa child’s education [see ILO Minimum Age Con-vention, 1973 (No. 138)].

The remaining 246 million children areinvolved in child labour which the ILO saysshould be abolished. These forms include:• Work performed by a child under the mini-

mum age specified for a particular kind ofwork by national legislation or internationalstandards.

• Hazardous work which jeopardizes the physi-cal, mental, or moral well-being of a child,either because of its nature or the conditionsin which it is performed.

• “Unconditional” worst forms of child labouras defined in the ILO Worst Forms of ChildLabour Convention, 1999 (No. 182)2.

In terms of geographical distribution, theAsia-Pacific region harbours the largest absolutenumber of working children between the ages of5 and 14, with some 127 million, or 60 per centof the world total. Sub-Saharan Africa is secondwith 48 million, or 23 per cent of the total, fol-lowed by Latin America and the Caribbean with17.4 million, or 8 per cent, and the Middle Eastand North Africa with 13.4 million, or 6 percent.

The report says about 2.5 million, or 1 per centof the world’s child labourers, are in the indus-trialized countries, while another 2.4 million arefound in transition economies.

Surveys in developing countries indicate thatthe vast majority (70 per cent) of children whowork are engaged in such primary sectors asagriculture, fishing, hunting and forestry. Some8 per cent are involved in manufacturing, whole-sale and retail trade, restaurants and hotels; 7 percent in domestic work and services; 4 per cent intransport, storage, and communication; and 3

a ssive problem”

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1 “A Future Without Child

Labour: Global Report under

the Follow-up to the ILO Decla-

ration on Fundamental Princi-

ples and Rights at Work”, Inter-

national Labour Conference,

90th Session, 2002, Report I

(B). International Labour

Office, Geneva. ISBN 92-2-

112416-9. Price: 20 Swiss

Francs. (The report may also

be consulted on the ILO Inter-

net Site, www.ilo.org/declara-

tion).

2 See Art. 3 (a) to (c), ILO Worst

Forms of Child Labour Con-

vention, 1999 (No. 182).

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per cent in construction, mining, and quarrying.Child labour often assumes serious propor-

tions in commercial agriculture associated withglobal markets for cocoa, coffee, cotton, rubber,sisal, tea, and other commodities. Studies inBrazil, Kenya, and Mexico have shown that chil-dren under 15 make up between 25 and 30 percent of the total labour force in the productionof various commodities. The report notes that“in many developed countries, agriculture is alsothe sector in which most children work”, andthat “family farms are a common exemptionfrom minimum age legislation”.

The informal economy, in which workers arenot recognized or protected under the legal andregulatory frameworks of the labour market, iswhere the most child labourers are found by far.

“The preponderance of child labour in theinformal economy, beyond the reach of mostformal institutions in countries at all levels ofincome, represents one of the principal chal-lenges to its effective abolition,” says the report.

Some work, such as mining and deep-sea fish-ing, is obviously dangerous, while other work,which at first sight may appear harmless, may besimilarly hazardous, especially for young, under-nourished, and otherwise vulnerable children.

CAUSES AND SOLUTIONSThe report lists the many causes of child

labour, all of which must be addressed. Whilepoverty is a major factor, there are many otherrelated causes, such as economic and politicalinstability, discrimination, migration, criminalexploitation, traditional cultural practices, a lackof decent work for adults, inadequate social pro-tection, a lack of schools, and the desire for con-sumer goods.

On the demand side, factors include a lack oflaw enforcement, the desire on the part of someemployers for a cheap and flexible workforce,and the low profitability and productivity ofsmall-scale family enterprises which cannotafford adult paid labour.

In spite of the difficulty of addressing all ofthese causes, the ILO report insists that “thecampaign for universal ratification of Conven-tion No. 182 has given the general fight againstchild labour a new urgency and scope, by focus-ing world attention on its worst forms”. Since itsunanimous adoption by the InternationalLabour Conference in 1999, Convention No. 182

has been ratified by nearly 120 of the ILO’s 175member States. In addition, the ILO MinimumAge Convention, 1973 (No. 138), has been rati-fied by 116 member States as of 25 April.

“The world is increasingly aware of child labour,and demanding action to stop it,” Mr. Somaviasaid. “A majority of governments across the worldnow acknowledge the existence of the problem –on greater or smaller scales and in different forms.Many have already set out to measure and under-stand it, and are taking action against it.”

The report will be discussed at the ILO’s 90thInternational Labour Conference, on June 12 inGeneva by the organization’s tripartite partners.On that day, the ILO is also launching an Inter-national Day Against Child Labour. The purposeof this initiative is to strengthen the internation-al momentum created in recent years to stopchild labour, especially in its worst forms, toreflect on the progress made so far, and to pur-sue fresh efforts to achieve a future without childlabour.

National and regional programmes have flour-ished under the ILO International Programmeon the Elimination of Child Labour, whichbegan with six participating countries in 1992with a single donor government (Germany), andhas expanded to include operations in 75 coun-tries funded by 26 donors. In 2001, the ILOlaunched its first Time-Bound Programmesaimed at eliminating the worst forms of childlabour in specific countries within 5 to 10 years.The first programmes are aimed at helping some100,000 children in El Salvador, Nepal and Tan-zania.

The report says partnerships between govern-ments, employers’ and workers’ organizations,with other civil society organizations, and withthe support of the international community,mean that real progress is being made in gettingchildren out of work which is damaging them,and into school, in supporting them and theirfamilies to develop better, more secure liveli-hoods, and in preventing other children frombeing drawn into child labour.

“This foundation must be built upon, expand-ed and sustained,” Mr. Somavia said. “The effec-tive abolition of child labour is one of the mosturgent challenges of our time, and should be auniversal goal.”

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new ILO initiative aims to use thearts and the media to educate

young people about child labour and tohelp them to join the fight for its abolition.Titled SCREAM – Supporting Children’sRights through Education, the Arts andthe Media – the programme encourageschildren to speak out against child labourthrough the media, drama, or other artforms.

At the pilot event in Ireland in 2001, forexample, a group of 16- and 17-year oldslearned about child labour, and thendeveloped their own play highlighting theplight of children who work. This wasthen performed to a wide range of thelocal community, including parents,teachers, and politicians.

Following the success of the pilotevent, the SCREAM programme will belaunched at the June 2002 InternationalLabour Conference. Several countrieshave already expressed an interest,including Nepal, Jordan, Italy, Switzer-land, Sweden, Turkey, Tanzania, El Sal-vador, France, Burkina Faso, Spain, andPortugal.

For further information, please contactthe International Programme on the Elim-ination of Child Labour (IPEC) at phone:+4122/799-8181, fax: +4122/799-8771, or e-mail: [email protected]

A


SCREAM AGAINST CHILD LABOUR

(Source: A Future Without Child Labour, ILO 2002)

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F O C U S : W O R L D D A Y A G A I N S T C H I L D L A B O U R



ILO AND INTER-PARLIAMENTARY UNION IN CAMPAIGN AGAINST WORST FORMS OF CHILD LABOUR

GENEVA – The Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) andthe ILO launched a new guide on “Eliminating theWorst Forms of Child Labour: A practical guide to ILOConvention No. 182”, at a conference in Moroccoearly this year. Prepared jointly by the IPU and the ILOand presented to the International Labour Office Gov-erning Body in March, the guide aims to providepolicymakers with the tools to translate internationalchild labour legislation into effective action in a range

of local contexts. India’s Najma Heptulla, President ofthe IPU Council, said, “Child labour is for many of ourcountries a major challenge. It’s not just by decreethat we will be able to eradicate the worst forms ofchild labour, but by creating a real coalition of politi-cal and social forces, and by showcasing effectiveaction.” (For more information, see www.ilo.org orwww.ipu.ch)

he ILO, UNICEF and UNHCRconvened a joint event,

highlighting child traffickingand how to counter it, on May 10,at the UN General AssemblySpecial Session on Children(UNGASS) in New York. Aimedat world leaders and policy-makers, the event showcasedsome of the work undertaken bythe ILO and UNICEF to preventtrafficking and to rehabilitatethose who have fallen victim to it.

GENEVA – The trafficking ofchildren is on the increase,according to a new ILO report,3

with most children trafficked intocommercial sexual exploitation.This is the worrying backgroundto the meeting which took placeat UNGASS; a meeting whichaimed both to inform govern-ments of the role of various agen-cies in dealing with trafficking,and to mobilize political will tocombat the problem.

Yet, as the report concedes,the scale of trafficking is huge:“It is a growing problem thataffects millions of children andfamilies in many countriesaround the world. Unchecked,

trafficking will continue to grow.”The report includes testimony

from many involved in the prob-lem, bringing home its humandimension. A border guard on theHungarian/Romanian border, forinstance, gives just one exampleof the many tactics used by traf-fickers: “...the smugglers split upfamilies, exchange the children,and say that the child will be lefthere now, and will be sent withthe next group, and if they catchyou and you say anything aboutus, the child will be hurt ... Theydrug the children, the adults, andmix sleeping pills into their foodso they don’t see which routethey are taking.”

According to Frans Röselaers,Director of the International Pro-gramme on the Elimination ofChild Labour (IPEC), the issuecan only be fully tackled when,“countries are committed toaddressing the problem as amatter of urgency, and when theinternational community is will-ing to join them and supportthem”. The hope is that, follow-ing the UNGASS meeting, thisaspiration may move closer torealization.

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UN family unites to counterchild traffickingT

3 “Unbearable to the Human Heart.

Trafficking of children: Problems

and responses worldwide”, the Inter-

national Programme on the Elimi-

nation of Child Labour, ILO, 2002.

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WORLD OF WORK, NO. 43, JUNE 2002 9

C A M B O D I A


ILO in Cambodia:Ten years after

ver the past decade, the ILO hasimproved the lives of tens of thousandsof Cambodians. From the devastation ofwar, economic isolation, and centralplanning, Cambodia has emerged as a

State with functioning roads and canals, an activetourism industry, and jobs which provide a decentexistence for its inhabitants. This article reviews theevolution of the ILO programme in Cambodia, whichcan be described as “The Work of Giants”

Ten years ago, the ILO moved into Cambodia with-in months of the signing of a peace agreement andstarted offering what everyone wanted most: employ-ment. Since then, the ILO Employment GenerationProgramme (EGP) has created millions of days of paidemployment, provided training in a host of trades,setup a thriving microcredit sector, and built ruralroads and bridges. More importantly, the ILO hasfound ways to generate sustainable development, whilecreating local ownership and exemplifying the ILOstandards for which the Organization stands.

“The results achieved by this programme have beenmost impressive,” says Trevor Riordan, one of the ear-lier EGP programme coordinators. “The EGP hasproved to be an excellent model for providing an emer-gency response to a country emerging from armedconflict. The ILO programme in Cambodia was one ofits most successful technical cooperation programmesin the Asia and Pacific Region. The innovativeapproach of combining skills development, small busi-ness training and labour-based technology, in one pro-gramme, greatly contributed to its success.”

After 20 years of war, Cambodia was one of theworld’s poorest countries with an estimated per capitaincome of US$150. Poverty was widespread, particu-larly in the small towns and the rural areas where infra-structure had been destroyed, agricultural land lay fal-low due to land mines, and economic activities wereextremely limited.

While it was recognized that agriculture provided

the largest number of employment opportunities, itwas also clear that many unemployed and underem-ployed members of vulnerable groups in Cambodiacould not be absorbed by the agricultural sector alone.Employment and income-generation were seen as keyissues in the rehabilitation and reconstruction of Cam-bodia.

In an effort to overcome these devastating effects, theILO, in collaboration with the United Nations Devel-opment Programme (UNDP), formulated the EGP,which aimed at creating non-agricultural employmentand income-generation opportunities for specific tar-get groups. The EGP integrated three components,along with international labour standards: labour-based rehabilitation, vocational training, and smallenterprise development.

The labour-based infrastructure rehabilitation andmaintenance project established offices in provincialdepartments of public works and identified prioritiesin close collaboration with provincial authorities. Roadconstruction was a top priority for local leaders. In1992-93, the ILO turned to LBTs (labour-based tech-nologies) to rehabilitate Cambodia’s secondary andrural roads. Work began in the northwest provinces inresponse to a request from UNHCR (the UN HighCommissioner for Refugees), whose task was to reset-tle people and give them access to food distribution.Within eight years, ILO infrastructure projects inCambodia gave local workers over 3 million workdays’direct paid employment. More than 540 kilometres ofrural roads and 80 bridges, 439 culvert rows, and 21watergates were rehabilitated and maintained. A 1999survey of the Puok market found an average fall in theprice of goods by 16 per cent since the ILO completedrural roads to it.

At Angkor Wat, the ILO joined forces with the Unit-ed Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Orga-nization (UNESCO), to help restore its value as atourism destination. Unskilled workers soon found

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work clearing vegetation from and around the monu-ments. They also revived the drainage system, recov-ered statues from insecure areas, ran a rubbish-collec-tion service and put up scaffolding for restorationspecialists.

Labour-based technology served to rehabilitate 44kilometres of secondary canals in Siem Rep province.As with road work, the project injected much moreinto the local economy than direct wages: it enlistedhaulers to transport materials, manufacturers to makehand tools and baskets, and contractors to prefabricateculverts and other concrete structures. It gave work toequipment repair shops and service suppliers. An esti-mated US$4,000 entered the local economy for eachkilometre of canal or road completed. By increasingwater-storage capacity, the irrigation works gave agri-culture a much-needed boost and helped stem the tideof rural-urban migration. Within eight years, ILOinfrastructure projects also trained hundreds of man-agers, contractors and government staff in business,accounting, language and computer skills on top oflabour-based construction and maintenance tech-niques.

To be able to sustain the growth made possible bybetter infrastructure, people needed business acumenand capital. Business and employment conditions inCambodia were especially bleak on the signing of thepeace accords in 1991. Most people in rural areaslacked employable skills. The labour market was large-ly unorganized and there was no reliable informationsystem or investment programme to bolster it.

In a bid to help the thousands of returnees from theborder camps, internally displaced people, demobi-lized military personnel, and vulnerable members of

the society, the ILO organized vocational training inseveral provinces by providing them with the skills togenerate income. The vocational training projectestablished a National Training Secretariat in PhnomPenh with the Ministry of Education, and established adecentralized network of seven provincial trainingcentres and outreach training units providing skill-development programmes linked to self employmentand small business opportunities. The training wasdelivered through a flexible approach of mobile train-ing in the villages close to the participants’ homes. Thiswas critical for many of the women who were heads ofhouseholds, as it allowed them to undertake trainingwhile still being able to maintain their householdresponsibilities. Previously many women had beenforced to drop out of the training courses as they wereunable to combine the training with their otherresponsibilities.

The first phase of the vocational training project(April 1993 to May 1996) was designed to provideskills training as quickly as possible for the large num-bers of returnees and internally displaced persons. Thevocational training project trained 4,900 people (42per cent women) in a diverse range of skills rangingfrom two-week courses on mushroom growing tofour-month courses on building construction. Duringthe same period, 4,000 trainees received small businesstraining; 3,000 trainees (67 per cent women) borrowedto start or expand a small business; 11,000 women inmicroenterprises received credit (average loan of US$40 with a recovery rate of 97 per cent).

During the second phase of the project (July 1996 toOctober 1998), which concentrated on institutionalcapacity-building and policy issues, about 2,500 per-

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sons were trained. The employment or self-employ-ment success rate for participants attending the secondphase of the project was 81 per cent, with higher ratesfor skill areas such as vegetable growing, shell craft, andtelevision repair. The average monthly income earnedby the participants after the completion of their train-ing was US$33, that is, at least twice as much as thesalary of a teacher. One of the most successful courseswas radio repair, with over 90 per cent of the traineeswho completed training courses finding employmentor self-employment, with an average income of US$46per month. Matching the training provided to theincome-generation or self employment opportunitiesavailable was one of the main reasons for its success.Once sufficient people in one district were trained in aparticular field, the training programme would moveto another district. This prevented the market beingsaturated with too many of the same products.

For businesses of any size to develop they must havecapital. In rural Cambodia, where income figures areamong the world’s lowest, savings (and banks) areoften non-existent. But some 80 NGOs have taken thelead in supplying seed money for micro and smallenterprises. The most important NGO involved inmicrofinancing is the Association of Cambodian LocalEconomic Development Agencies, better known asACLEDA. ACLEDA opened its doors in 1993, with thesupport of the ILO and the United Nations Develop-ment Programme (UNDP). By October 2000, it had

become a licensed bank, with 49 branches and officesin 14 provinces, chiefly in rural areas. Its loan-repay-ment record is now greater than 95 per cent. ACLEDAoffers three kinds of loans: microcredit loans, collater-alized small-enterprise loans, and small-scale industryloans. ACLEDA has become the most active lender inCambodia, with a loan portfolio of some US$15.6 mil-lion.

Respect for the rights enshrined in internationallabour standards is a fixture of the ILO’s work in Cam-bodia. The conditions of recruitment and employ-ment embody the core principles in ILO Conventionsagainst forced labour, child labour, and discrimina-tion. They offer guidelines for good practice. Half ofthe workers of an ILO-sponsored construction sitewere women. Men and women were equally paid andremunerated fairly. Many of them received specialtraining, and ACLEDA has given female entrepreneurssubstantial management and business training. ACLE-DA has built gender balance into its recruitment poli-cy, and is committed to hiring women and men inequal numbers. The vocational training project devel-oped a special entry level test to ensure that women,and other disadvantaged groups, were given priorityaccess to all courses. The ILO also began addressing theneeds of the disabled by identifying specially adapted,commercially available and affordable farming androad building tools, in order to integrate them into thelabour market.

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LOCAL OWNERSHIP WORKS

he ILO approach to poverty alleviation hasproven sustainable thanks to the development

of local ownership. At the community level, thestructures and principles put in place under theproject, in close collaboration with Khmer counter-parts, are being protected and extended. To helpthe local population take charge of road mainte-nance, the ILO set up a system of “length persons”.They set their own schedules, so that the ten daysor so per month it usually takes do not interferewith the crop schedule. A number of road commit-tees have also been established to look after lower-order rural roads. Both maintenance problems andwater disputes within the Bovel and Baray irriga-tion systems in Siem Rep province, are handled bywater-user groups.

As soon as the site of Angkor Wat had beencleared, the ILO set up a periodic-maintenancescheme to keep it looking trim. Cambodian counter-parts were recruited, trained and put in charge.ACLEDA is another successful ILO-boosted entitynow in local hands. The courses offered at theFrench-funded “Institut de Technologie du Cam-bodge”, originally set up by the ILO in close collab-oration with the Institute, are now given by Khmerlecturers. For new roads and development proj-ects, the people must get into the planning processearly on. Members of each community must beapprised of the options, given the means to reachdecisions democratically, and empowered to seetheir decision through the integrated rural accessi-bility planning (IRAP).

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re threats, insults, sabotage all in aday’s work? Seemingly so, accordingto a recent outpouring of horrorstories at a labour gathering inMontreal. Canadian journalist Jean-

Sébastien Marsan reports on how mobbing isbecoming the new bane among workers, andwhat worker and employer representatives cando about it

MONTREAL, Canada – A female employeereceives daily rape threats via anonymous e-mails,driving her to a nervous breakdown. A managerremoves doors from the toilets, accusing hisemployees of wasting time there. Day-shift miners,at odds with the night-shift, purposely neglect tomention which underground gallery walls areliable to collapse on them.

All in a day’s work? Unfortunately, increasinglyso. The above examples were cited last year at theXIVth Annual Conference of the Social Delegatesof the Montreal Metropolitan Regional Council ofthe Federation of Quebec Workers (FTQ, inFrench), the most important central union ofQuebec Province of Canada.

Each of the 252 social delegates of the Council,meeting in a Montreal hotel for a day of confer-ences and workshops, had a horror story to tell.This year, harassment and violence were the themeof nearly all of their regional meetings.

In the opinion of the Montreal social delegates,moral (or psychological) harassment has recentlybeen added to “traditional” violence (fighting, sex-ual aggression, racism, sabotage, etc.). The cause?“All of the pressures related to the reorganizationof work and the lack of staff,” says Denise Gagnon,coordinator of the network of social delegates ofthe FTQ, without hesitation. “People becomephysically or mentally ill. Or else, to relieve thestress, they will actually attack each other.”

THE ROLE OF “SOCIAL DELEGATES”Unknown to the general public of Quebec,

social delegates are trained by the unions to forma self-help network. In the 1980s, they targeted pri-marily personal problems: drug addiction, familybreakups, debts, compulsive gambling, depression,suicidal tendencies, etc. Since the 1990s, they areconcerned far more with interpersonal conflictsrelated to the organization (or disorganization!) ofwork.

“The social delegate is a natural assistant in one’swork environment,” explains Jean-Luc Pagé, socialdelegate of Local 301 of the SCFP (a blue-collarworkers’ union of the city of Montreal). “He playsthe concurrent role of listener, mediator and, inextreme cases, of supplying resources. That’s doneon a person-to-person basis; they aren’t therapists,priests or members of Alcoholics Anonymous.Their primary role is to take people under theirwings and refer them to professionals (psycholo-gists, doctors, etc.).”

The programme of the social delegates of theRegional Council of the FTQ was launched in1984. The FTQ counts some 1,200 social delegatesin Montreal and nearly 2,300 in the whole of theProvince of Quebec. A network of “social workers”who have no equivalent in the other central unionsof Quebec.

François Courcy is the author of a study of 600workers (including 318 FTQ members), concern-ing violence in the workplace. An industrial psy-chologist, he was invited to the Conference, wherehe painted a portrait of vicious hostility, more ver-bal and psychological than physical.

The violence of the twenty-first century is indi-rect (for example, by not contradicting a falserumour rather than insulting someone in person)and passive – not notifying a worker of a risk ofaccident rather than provoking the accident one-self, or psychologically destroying an employeesimply by ostracizing him, by ignoring or isolating


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him from his colleagues. The victim’s co-workerswill close their eyes to the situation, out of fear orcowardice. The aggressor gets off free.

“The problem is the competition among work-ers for the job, especially for overtime work,”maintains Francine Burnonville, coordinator ofthe network of social delegates of the MetropolitanMontreal Regional Council.

To keep a job or to get overtime work, “the vio-lence won’t be racist or sexual, which is no longeracceptable, and there won’t be a punch in the face”,Francine Burnonville explains. “The behaviourwill be on another level, passive violence: accusa-tions of incompetence, manipulating things sothat an employee seems insane, so he doesn’t havehis tools, in other words petty, mean things.”

THE EMPLOYER’S RESPONSIBILITYBetween 1990 and 1999, the number of com-

plaints before the Quebec Commission of Healthand Security in the Workplace (CSST, in French)for “psychological injury” doubled. FrançoisCourcy pointed out that five to six Quebecworkers commit suicide every week for a work-related reason. Every week!

Rather than changing the organization ofwork, which is often based on performance atany price, employers prefer to attribute the vio-lence to what François Courcy calls the “myth ofthe profile of the aggressor”.

A small, practical book published recently byLes Editions Transcontinental, “Un collègue veutvotre peau” [A Colleague Wants Your Scalp](Montreal, “S.O.S. boulot” collection), describesthree archetypes of the aggressor:1. The “brute”, a brutal person beyond redemp-tion, who since childhood has enjoyed destroy-ing the dignity of others.

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2. The “politician”, an ambitious employee whoharasses a colleague and takes the colleague’sideas for his own, to get a promotion or to curryfavour with management.3. The “imposter”, an incompetent employeewho hides his mistakes by maligning others.

Three types of victims correspond to thesethree types of aggressors:1. The “brute” chooses easy targets, who areemotionally fragile or who cannot afford to quittheir jobs.2. The “politician” goes after employees consid-ered competition which has to be eliminated.3. The “imposter”, to protect himself, discreditshis former colleagues.

These types of behaviour, no doubt useful,have the shortcoming of not questioning theemployer’s responsibility. The author of “Un col-lègue veut votre peau”, limits the problem torelationships between employees, as though it isentirely up to the workers to warn of and treatthis aggression. This doesn’t help at all, sinceworkers are often being individualists and insen-sitive, and each one is looking to keep his job atall costs.

In his famous “Le harcèlement moral: La vio-lence perverse au quotidien” [Moral Harass-ment: Vicious Daily Violence] (Syros, Paris,1998), a book which has had a significant impactin France and elsewhere, the psychiatrist andpsychoanalyst Marie-France Hirigoyen writes,“One must not trivialize harassment by makingit a fatalistic characteristic of our society.

This is not the result of the current economiccrisis; it only stems from an organizational per-missiveness.”

In 2001, the author continued her thought in“Malaise dans le travail: Le harcèlement moral,démêler le vrai du faux” [”Unease at Work:Moral harassment; separating truth from fic-tion”], in which she hoped governments wouldrequire enterprises to provide prevention pro-grammes against what is not a personal weak-ness, but is in fact a collective disease. In France,the idea of moral harassment has very recentlyappeared in the Labour Code.“This means that there is some violence in a cer-tain milieu; it is the way in which the people aremanaged,” says François Courcy.“And who man-ages at the end of the day? The employer.” The

social delegate Jean-Luc Pagé goes even further:“Work organization is violent. People becomeintolerant, impatient, tired, worn out, aggressive,and nobody listens to them.”

François Courcy, during his field investiga-tions, noted that the majority of employers closetheir eyes to violence. This has important reper-cussions on the enterprises: increase in absen-teeism, drastic reduction in productivity, loss ofcustomers, increase in the number of grievances,costs of replacement of employees who resign orare on sick leave, increase in contributions toCSST. End result: lower profits.

UNION VIOLENCE?The trade unions are not immune. Despite vig-

ilance by union officials, members may use vio-lence or harassment to pursue their ends. This was“the” question of the annual Conference of theMontreal social delegates last November: what todo with violent unions?

Jean-Luc Pagé of the very militant blue-collarunion of the city of Montreal, confesses: “We areconsidered a union which is rather violent, buteverything is being done to counter violence.There may be dysfunctional individuals in aunion; I’ve known some of them. The unionsmust raise awareness among their members andtheir organizations to combat this scourge moreeffectively, but I don’t think our union organiza-tions are inherently violent.”

“Labour relations are power struggles; this isnot an area without violence,” according to DeniseGagnon. “I’ve been campaigning for 25 years. Atfirst, collective bargaining was a policy of table-thumping rather than argumentation,” says theunionist. “Today, one collects information and isbetter prepared before the negotiations begin, inorder not to run into a blank wall. Twenty yearsago ten per cent of [labour] contracts ended inconflict; today one speaks of 3 to 5 per cent.”

In a case of violence in the workplace, a unionhas the duty to represent equitably the aggressorand the presumed victim before the CSST or thetribunals. Caught between a rock and a hard place,the social delegates of the FTQ prove that labourrelations go well beyond banners and collectiveagreements.

Jean-Sébastien Marsan ([email protected]) is an independent journalist

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In India, an industry worksto retain its shine

centuries-old traditional and skill-intensive industry in Moradabad,India, brass/metalware productionis suffering the effects of stiff com-petition from abroad. Kiran Mehra-

Kerpelman of World of Work, who recently vis-ited the area, explains how the ILO helps smalland household production units and manufac-turers to face the challenges of improved work-ing conditions and improved productivity

MORADABAD, India. – For 50-year oldMohammad Shafiq, a retired master artisan inthis city in the Indian State of Uttar Pradesh,installing a new chimney in his brass works wasa source of great pride.

“I was inhaling so much smoke from the fur-nace every day, it was bad for my health,” saysMr. Shafiq, whose two sons have now taken over

his work here melting brass and pouring it intomoulds to make small parts. “Conditions ofwork are very harsh, and if we don’t make thedeadlines or meet the quality requirements, welose the order. We are also facing the challenge ofbetter and cheaper products from other coun-tries.”

As a result of a new ILO programme, however,many of his problems literally went up in smoke.Next to the first chimney providing for properexhaust ventilation, Mr. Shafiq has installed asecond to prevent the spreading of chemical gas.

And as part of the programme, he has alsolearned about health and safety precautionswhich can prevent the frequent injuries, espe-cially burns which he has suffered over the years.Such better management of the workplace hasincreased the productivity of his sons by 25 percent.


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SMALL ENTERPRISE, BIG BUSINESSBrassware is a shining example of a small

business with a global lustre. There are morethan 1,000 organized units and over 25,000 arti-sanal units in Moradabad producing itemswhich will eventually end up in larger work-shops, or be sold to manufacturers andexporters. “You name it, we make it,” says RajanSawhney, Merchandising Manager of Salar Over-seas, which exports some US$4 million annuallyto such outlets as Body Shop, the Bombay Com-pany, Spiegel Catalogue Services, FederatedBrook, Macy’s, Bloomingdale’s, Ikea and Har-rods. “People are willing to work, and the ILOhas brought us this new way of working togetherwith all partners to reach a common goal.”(See box)

Yet, as competition intensifies, the livelihoodsof these artisans are increasingly threatened.More than US$400 million worth of exports arenow in danger because of global competitionfrom China, Taiwan, and other countries in theregion. Despite increases in production andexports, productivity remains low, often theresult of a poor working environment.

“If the government does not increase its sup-port and we do not improve our infrastructure,we are not going to be able to compete withother countries where the government is provid-ing important incentives and facilities,” saysParveen Garg, General Secretary of the Brass ArtWare Manufacturers’ (Exporters’) Association,and an exporter himself. “Through an ILO-sponsored study tour, we visited factories inChina where the working conditions are better,

there is less red tape,but the wages arelower,” he continues.“They also have a bet-ter market share inNorth America.”

Through its InFocusProgramme on SmallEnterprise Develop-ment, and the SouthAsia Multidiscipli-nary Advisory Team,the ILO has launcheda pilot programme toshow that improvedquality of workingconditions and busi-

ness practices can have a very positive effect onproductivity and competitiveness.

Improvements also provide the opportunityfor equitable profit-sharing across the industryand the community. Working together with gov-ernment agencies, workers’ and employers’organizations, brass trade and export associa-tions, and local partner organizations, the ILOhas helped to train artisans in better businesspractices, in improving working conditions, andhas also provided the opportunity for a few tovisit other countries to observe manufacturingpractices.

The chain of work starts at the level of smalland household units which are subcontractedfor specific jobs by larger workshops, which inturn receive their contracts from manufactur-ers/exporters. The latter receive their ordersfrom multinational companies, through buyingagencies in New Delhi, which also provide prod-uct design. “The ILO is helping to improve thesupply chain by adding value through improvedproductivity, product quality and overall com-petitiveness,” says Chaman Dhanda, ILO Pro-gramme Coordinator for this programme. “It isenabling the household units to improve marketaccessibility and provide opportunities toupgrade technologically. It is promoting betterlinks between the various business actors andencouraging better local infrastructure.”

WHO BENEFITS AND HOW?• Large manufacturers/exporters benefit from

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through improved productivity, market link-ages, and access to better technology.

• Smaller workshops benefit from an increasein added value and the resulting higher returnon their work, while benefiting at the sametime from an improved working environ-ment.

• Local institutions and partner organizationshave benefited from capacity-building forproviding business advisory services.

• Local service providers in the town have wit-nessed an increase in the provision of busi-ness development and training inputs.

While the ILO continues in its endeavour tohelp the artisans modernize and the manufac-turers to become more competitive in the global

market, people like Mohammad Shafiq’s sonscontinue to hope for a better future within thisindustry. For them, there is no other future.“Ourfather is a master artisan, and we will carry onthis trade which we have learned from him.”They will continue to make brass parts for therest of their lives, on the condition, of course,that the industry can withstand the erosion indemand and that they can continue to attractcustomers.

SALAR OVERSEAS

n cooperation with the ILO, Salar Overseas hasimplemented many improvements to its modern

work space. There is no lack of water. An air suc-tion system has been installed to rid the air of dustfrom polishing material and to remove noxiousfumes. “The workers do not have to leave the work-shop as frequently to get fresh air, and they havefewer respiratory problems,” says J.C. Sharma,Management Representative. “This, in turn, leadsto less absenteeism and has improved productivityby more than 20 per cent.” Work capacity hasincreased and workers are less tired. “We shouldbe able to recover the cost of new equipment with-in the next three years,” he adds. The unit has alsoimplemented other ILO recommendations: properlight, heat protection, and methods to improve workposture. “The workers are happy and more produc-tive than before. This company is still receivingorders for the current year, despite the generalslowdown in the business activities in this town,”says Rajan Sawhney.

Mohamed Muslim, the owner of Salar, was him-self an artisan who started working very young, andhad great dreams. His father was also an artisan.Mohamed Muslim had a vision, and he workedtowards achieving a goal. He still believes in moral-ity and high principles. Not having received school-ing himself, he believes strongly in the power ofeducation. “Education is a must to find the realpath,” he says. “Our objective can only be obtained

by mapping our route with the help of education.”Salar Overseas has sponsored two schools. Hewould also like to build a model factory with thebest facilities. He was one of the first to embracethe ILO programme, and sent his General Managerto the ILO workshop.

His 20-year old daughter, Saira, has recently fin-ished university and now works beside her father.She is the eldest of four sisters and a three-year oldbrother. While waiting for her brother to grow up,she wants to learn all the different facets of thebusiness and help her father fulfill his dreams. Shewill soon be taking her first business trip abroad.Her father says that his daughters are his inspira-tion. Will she leave to get married as traditionrequires? “My father will never force me to marry,”she says, “and for the moment that is far from mymind.” So what does her father say to that? “I’m OKwith whatever she wants,but I would like it if sheseeks my permission. Liveand let live.” Modernideas which are help-ing him to head amodern and suc-cessful venture.

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ast Timor has come a longway since the establishmentof the United Nations Tran-sitional Administration inthe country, in 1999. The

world’s newest State has emerged, andin May of this year, a new labour codewas signed into force. The new code,developed in consultation with theILO InFocus Programme on Dialogue(IFP Dialogue) and the RegionalOffice for Asia and the Pacific, pro-vides for a comprehensive and fairlabour relations system based on fun-damental ILO principles. The goal: tohelp create jobs and to provide basicstandards – from sick leave to equalityamong men and women.

DILI, East Timor – In a countryrecently emerging from devastatingpolitical strife, how do you createlabour standards? That is the work ofthe ILO, and in East Timor, new rules

on hours of work, sick leave, maternity benefits, childlabour, dispute settlement, and equal treatment ofwomen, are now enshrined in law.

The development of the new labour code for EastTimor is part of the ILO project on strengthening andimproving labour relations in East Timor (SIMPLAR),funded by the US Department of Labor. The projectaims to contribute to East Timor’s social and economic

progress through the establishment and operation of aneffective labour relations system. In the future, the ILO,mainly through SIMPLAR, will continue working withgovernment, workers’ and employers’ organizations –building capacity to use social dialogue to achieveresults which benefit all three.

Another project focuses on skills and employability,and creating employment opportunities through voca-tional training. Funded by the Portuguese Governmentand implemented by the ILO InFocus Programme onCrisis Response and Reconstruction, the project beganin October 2001.

“The labour code must be used, and used well,” saidILO Regional Director for Asia and the Pacific,Yasuyuki Nodera at a May Day ceremony here launch-ing the code. “If any one of the tripartite partners isnot able to use the code properly, then it is quite pos-sible that the principles it upholds won’t flow throughinto the day-to-day practice of labour relations.”

Gagan Rajbhandari, the ILO representative in Dili,spoke to World of Work about the employment situationin East Timor and the ILO’s work there.

How would you characterize the employment situationin East Timor?East Timor is an agrarian society with a largely subsis-tence economy in which much of the production is con-sumed by the producers (home consumption).About 76per cent of the people live in rural areas, and the pooramong them account for 85 per cent of the nation'spoor. East Timor has a young population, with about 48per cent below the age of 17. The labour force participa-


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East Timor:A New labour code f

T H E L O N G R O A D T O I N D E P E N D E N C E

1975 - Portugal withdraws from Timor

1976 - Indonesia annexes Timor

1998 - Timor votes independence

1999 - UN Transitional Administration (UNTAET) established

2002: 1 May - East Timor adopts new labour code

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tion rate is about 74 per cent overall, and a little over 50per cent for women. About three-quarters of thoseemployed are in agriculture. Open unemployment, arecent phenomenon, especially among youth, is in excessof 16 per cent. Entrepreneurial, technical, and vocation-al skills are lacking in every sector of the East Timoreseeconomy. The proposed national development planstresses that one of the most important challenges forEast Timor, both currently and in the foreseeable future,is to create jobs – both in the formal and the informalsectors – to meet the needs of the country’s youth. Some15,000 to 20,000 young East Timorese enter the work-ing-age population each year, far more than the antici-pated number of jobs in the public sector.

What are the most urgent labour issues to be dealt withby the Government of East Timor? Is child labour one ofthem? Lack of productive skills and lack of remunerativeemployment opportunities are urgent issues. The Gov-ernment is also keen to develop legislative provisionsfor social security, and occupational safety and health. Itfaces another challenge in terms of bringing ex-com-batants back into the main stream of the nationaldevelopment process. Until recently, the absence of aformal labour law framework made dealing with labourdisputes difficult. However, the new labour code waspromulgated on 1 May 2002. The Government of EastTimor has also indicated its interest in becoming an ILOmember State, and is keen to ratify the ILO’s eight fun-damental Conventions.Children help adults with household work and onfarms. More recently we have begun to see childrenworking on the streets – particularly in the capital cityDili. About 200 to 300 children sell VCDs in the streetsand wash cars. A UNICEF study has found that most ofthese children are trying to escape domestic violenceand/or poverty at home. In many cases their parents (orcare providers) have sent them there to generate extraincome for the family.

What are the main obstacles encountered by the Gov-ernment in terms of labour and employment?The Government lacks technical expertise andresources to respond to issues related to labour andemployment. To help address the need for employment,

the East Timorese National Development Plan arguesfor an extension of the current on-the-job trainingundertaken in informal economy workshops through-out the country. It also calls for employers in the formalsector to design and implement basic training pro-grammes, and to further the development of existingdonor and church programmes in vocational training.The plan also proposes that the Government establish aunit responsible for technical and vocational educationand training. In fact, the new labour code requires theDepartment of Labour and Solidarity to establish aDivision of Vocational Training and Employment, withthree units, covering skills development and upgrading,employment services, and labour market assessment.Community-based training centres will also be set up inthe countryside, to train people in the skills needed inthe local informal economy and to provide advice onemployment. These centres will also provide basic serv-ices to match people, skills, and jobs.

What are the most promising development sectors for jobcreation in East Timor? Is tourism one of them and why?The areas most likely to grow include the informal econ-omy, micro- and small enterprises, and the service sec-tor. Tourism is one of the target industries, but it is achallenge. Both infrastructure and training are needed.

How is the ILO assisting the Government of East Timorregarding employment and labour-related issues? Canyou briefly mention the main areas of focus of the ILOprogramme in East Timor? All of the ILO activities in East Timor are designed tomake sure that decent and productive work is part oflife for the citizens of this new nation. One of the firststeps was, of course, to provide a legal framework forbetter labour relations, in the form of a labour code. Wenow have a technical cooperation project focusing onhelping the Government of East Timor, and employersand workers to implement this code. Another projectwill work with employers and workers, encouragingthem to use social dialogue to improve labour relations.Cost-effective training is the key aim of another project,working to make sure that the unemployed and othervulnerable groups can develop the skills they need tofind decent, sustainable employment.

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■ How has September 11 affectedworkers in the United States? Accord-ing to a study of some 140 companiesby the Bureau of National Affairs inWashington, DC, employee anxietyincreased in three out of four firmsafter the attacks. Their emotional state,however, has had no discernibleimpact on productivity, absenteeism,tardiness, or quality of work. Thestudy said what did change was theattitude towards security at work;employers pay closer attention to theiremployees’ safety and security, inorder to ensure that the workplace isfree of recognized hazards. Employees,on their side have to comply withsecurity checks, such as e-mail or voicemonitoring which they would havepreviously found intrusive.– Source, Workforce, 1 March 2002

■ In New York, target of the biggestattack, large enterprises are feeling

more vulnerable than small ones.According to a survey by the NationalFederation of Independent Businesses,only 25 per cent of 300 small business-es in New York increased, or plan toreinforce, security since September 11.The survey said some small enterpris-es felt less likely to be targeted. Othersapparently thought that taking newsecurity measures was just too expen-sive.– Source, Wall Street Journal,11 March 2002

■ They may have a point. Securityconsultants are seeing major increasesin business. One security firm with2,500 employees has seen its companyassessment business skyrocket by1,000 per cent since September 11.Companies which host security work-shops are also paying hefty fees. Onegroup charges US$20,000 for a half-day seminar for three to four seniorlevel-executives.– Source, Wall Street Journal,11 March 2002

■ Worldwide, the demand of “bio-metric” security identification devicesis rising fast, as governments and busi-nesses seek to enhance security andidentification methods. One SouthKorean firm sold 3,000 iris-recogni-tion devices last year, and are in talkswith three international airports tosupply such machines. Says one com-pany official, “the technology is still inits infancy, but the potential is huge”.– Source, Financial Times,8 February 2002

■ Are biometric devices the answer?In the aftermath of September 11,great attention is being given todevices which claim to recognize anindividual by identifying physiological

features, such as the shape of the reti-nae or fingerprints. Prior to the terror-ist attacks on the US, such recognitiondevices were only used in restrictedareas. Now, an increasing number anddiversity of companies are using bio-metrics to ensure their security,despite the fact that it is not alwaysreliable.– Source, Newcastle Herald,25 March 2002

■ In the US, background checks arebeing conducted in a wider range ofcompanies and on different types ofemployees, since last September. Auto-matic Data Processing, a humanresource services company, saw itsnumber of new customers per monthjump from an average of 200 to 500, to10,000 since then. In addition to back-ground checks for top executive postsand new hires, firms are now conduct-ing searches for all levels of employees,as well as current staff who had neverbeen screened.– Source, Kiplinger Business Forecasts,4 February 2002

■ Meanwhile, a survey by TMPWorldwide, of 5,000 Australiansrevealed that 85 per cent of employersdo background checks on potentialemployees, in order to provide a moresecure workplace to employees and toavoid hiring “dangerous” persons.– Source, Gold Coast Bulletin,4 April 2002

■ And what about security guards?One US security firm which hires16,000 guards a year, found throughadvance screening that 20 per cent hadcriminal records. Although not allsecurity providers perform back-ground checks on their guards, thepractice has become more commonsince September 11.– Source, Wall Street Journal,11 March 2002

P L A N E T W O R K

WORKPLACE SECURITY

A REVIEW OF TRENDS AND DEVELOPMENTS IN LABOUR ISSUES

F E A T U R E S

P L A N E T W O R K A R O U N D T H E C O N T I N E N T S I L O I N T H E P R E S SN E W S

BACKGROUND CHECKS

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■ Who goes there? Who knows? Anindependent national workplace sur-vey sponsored by the Hartford Finan-cial Services Group – providers ofworkers’ compensation insurance –reveals that one-third of the employerssurveyed still allow unauthorized per-sons to enter their buildings withoutperforming any screening.– Source, PR Newswire, 2 May 2002

■ In Australia, some companies aretrying to keep a lower profile, havingtheir names taken off buildings andthus avoiding calling attention tothemselves. The use of retinal or fin-gerprint scanning has also become acommon measure.– Source, Sunday Age, 3 February 2002

■ And otherwise...Will the World Cup score points in

labour talks? As part of a labour settle-ment in Germany, some employeesmay enjoy “football breaks” during theglobal tournament, allowing them toroot for the home team during work-ing hours. The proposal was discussedduring an IG Metall Union strike as a

possible incentive to keep football-crazy workers on the job instead of athome in front of the TV set. A spokes-men for IG Metall said the strike wasfundamentally “about pay and equali-ty”, not football, but conceded that“watching our team wouldn’t besomething we would say “no” to”.– Source: London Evening Standard,13 May 2002

■ Cutting staff may actually costemployers. It’s well known that global-ization, mergers and acquisitions, andcompany restructuring, often lead toserious problems for employees, yetthey may cause difficulties for compa-nies too. A recent survey by WatsonWyatt revealed that 30 per cent ofcompanies cutting staff numbers actu-ally ended with increased costs. Over afifth also said that, after a large num-ber of redundancies, they realized theyhad eliminated the wrong people. Inaddition 80 per cent of companies sur-veyed admitted that after the job cutsstaff morale had “collapsed”.– Source, Business World Philippines,15 May 2002

■ In hospitals, staff are sufferingfrom high “bariatric” pressure. Han-dling patients considered “bariatric” –a new term for people who areextremely obese – may be hazardous tothe health of hospital workers. Onehospital reported that it had to obtainspecial lifting equipment to train staffto handle overweight patients withoutinjuring themselves. One male nursewho weighed in at over 100 kilograms,was injured helping a patient who wasdouble his weight. “Lift teams” arebeing formed in other hospitals.– Source, Wall Street Journal,1 May 2002

M E D I A S H E L F

■ For many workers, being postedabroad nowadays is causing increasinganxiety. According to a recent survey,expatriates often feel their companiesaren’t doing enough to help them dealwith the difficulties of being on mission ina foreign country.

Conducted by CIGN InternationalExpatriate Benefits, the US National For-eign Trade Council, and World at Work,the study found that more than half ofexpatriates lacked information on securi-ty and health issues, negatively affectingtheir peace of mind and prospects forsuccess. About 40 per cent of respon-dents said their companies failed to pre-pare them adequately for their interna-tional assignments.

Coordination between the localcountry and the home office HumanResources Department was rated nega-tively by 56 per cent of those surveyed.Partly as a result, 35 per cent expected toleave their current employer within the

next five years.The survey results may be worrying

for many companies, given the expenseassociated with sending people abroad –the cost of such an employee on a three-year mission is on average one million USdollars. For many of the companiesinvolved, staff retention is said to be amajor financial concern.

The study says companies shouldconsider a range of policies to make themove abroad go smoothly: cross-culturaland language training, providing healthand safety information, ensuring expatri-ate benefits are sufficiently generous,providing cultural adjustment assistancefor families of expatriates, and helpingexecutives balance both personal andprofessional needs. Given the cost ofsending people abroad and then havingto replace them, for many companiessuch measures may represent an overallsaving.– Source, PR Newswire US, 14 May 2002

FEAR OF TRANSFERRING? WORKING ABROAD MAY BE GETTING SCARY

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World Commission on the SocialDimension of Globalization meets

GENEVA – The ILO added a new voice to thepublic debate on globalization in February, withthe launch of the World Commission on theSocial Dimension of Globalization. The Com-mission aims to build a consensus on a model ofglobalization which reduces poverty and insecu-rity, and increases opportunities for all.

The decision to establish the independentCommission was taken in November 2001 bythe Governing Body of the ILO, at a criticalmoment in the public debate on globalization.

As the Commission’s Co-chair, Finland’sPresident Tarja Halonen, told the first meetingof the body in March, “There is neither timenor use to invent the wheel anew. I think ourtask is to find out, and speak out, on what hasto be done in order to make globalization workfor people and the environment.”

Declared Co-chair, Tanzanian President Ben-jamin Mkapa,“It is true that globalization didnot invent mass unemployment or inequalities,but it is not without reason that in many minds– in rich and poor countries – the word “glob-alization” conjures up ugly images of job losseson a large scale and of losses of income that

threaten people’s welfare and accustomed waysof life.”

MANDATE OF THE COMMISSIONThe World Commission on the Social Dimen-

sion of Globalization will prepare an authoritativereport which will include an in-depth analysis ofthe social dimension of globalization and theimplications of this analysis on decent work,poverty reduction, and development. A majorobjective of the Commission is to respond to theneed for an integrated policy framework whichadvances both economic and social goals in theglobal economy.

The Commission held its second meeting inMay, and is expected to submit its final report tothe Director-General late in 2003.

There are 21 appointed members of the WorldCommission, of recognized eminence andauthority who reflect the principal views andpolicy perspectives in globalization debates, aswell as the experiences of various regions of theworld. Additionally, the Chair and two Vice-Chairs of the ILO Governing Body, as well as theILO Director-General, serve as ex officio mem-

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bers. All members of the Commission partici-pate in their personal capacity.

The Commission is co-chaired by PresidentTarja Halonen of Finland and President BenjaminMkapa of Tanzania. The other Commission mem-bers are: Valentina Matvienka, Deputy Prime Min-ister of Russia; Eveline Herfkens, Minister forDevelopment Co-operation of the Netherlands;Taizo Nishimuro, President and CEO of the Toshi-ba Corporation; Giuliano Amato, former ItalianPremier; Joseph Stiglitz, winner of the 2001 NobelPrize for Economics; Julio Maria Sanguinetti, for-mer President of Uruguay; Ruth C.L. Cardosa, firstLady of Brazil and President of that country’sCommunity Solidarity Council; Ann McLaughlinKorologos, Vice-Chair of the Rand Corporationand former US Secretary of Labor; Surin Pitsuwan,former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Thailand;Deepak Nayyar, Vice-Chancellor of the University

of Delhi and former Chief Economic Advisor tothe Government of India; Hernando de Soto,author and President of the Institute for Libertyand Democracy in Peru; John Sweeney, Presidentof the AFL-CIO; François Perigot, President of theInternational Organization of Employers, France;Heba Handousa of Egypt, Managing Director ofthe Economic Research Forum for the Arab coun-tries, Iran, and Turkey; Lu Mai, Secretary-Generalof the China Development Research Centre; Vic-toria Tauli-Corpus of the Philippines, Chair-Rap-porteur of the Board of Trustees of the UN Volun-tary Fund for Indigenous Populations; Aminata D.Traore of Mali, author and Coordinator of theAfrican Social Forum; Ernst Ulrich von Weizaecker,scientist and German parliamentarian, andZwelinzima Vavi, General Secretary of the Cong-ress of South African Trade Unions.

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Workers’ Memorial Day ceremony focuses on emergencyworkers, firefighters

GENEVA – The millions of workers who die eachyear from work-related accidents or diseases, or areinjured, were remembered at a special ceremony tomark Workers’ Memorial Day on 29 April at theILO, which brought its tripartite strength to a cam-paign initiated in 1995 by the International Con-federation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU).

The purpose of Workers’ Memorial Day is to callattention to the extent of workplace accidents andillness, and to promote awareness of health andsafety issues in general. This year’s meeting focusedon the dangers faced by a particularly vulnerablecategory of workers, those in emergency services,including firefighters, ambulance drivers, doctorsand nurses, and policemen and policewomen.

Among the special invited guests were two repre-sentatives of the New York City Fire Department,Brian Cleary and Keith Ruby, who spoke on behalfof the International Association of Firefighters,AFL-CIO, about the hazardous rescue operations

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undertaken in the aftermath of the September 11bombing at the World Trade Center in New YorkCity.

Noting that 343 New York firefighters and 50police officers were killed that day, Cleary said,“History tells us that emergency workers havealways confronted danger. Some injured, manykilled, but all of us pay a price.”

“The death, injury, disability, and illness sufferedby emergency workers while carrying out their job,has a dramatic impact on individuals, co-workers,families and friends,” he said. “We need ouremployers, our Municipalities to share in our com-mitment, not only after a tragedy, but before atragedy has occurred.”

GLOBAL ESTIMATESThe ILO estimates that approximately two mil-

lion workers lose their lives annually due to occu-pational injuries and illnesses, with accidents caus-ing at least 350,000 deaths a year. For every fatalaccident, there are an estimated 1,000 non-fatalinjuries, many of which result in lost earnings, per-

manent disability, and poverty. The death toll atwork, much of which is attributable to unsafeworking practices, is the equivalent of 5,000 work-ers dying each day, three persons every minute.

This is more than double the figure for deathsfrom warfare (650,000 deaths per year). Accordingto the ILO SafeWork programme, work kills morepeople than alcohol and drugs together, and theresulting loss in gross domestic product is 20 timesgreater than all official development assistance todeveloping countries. Hazardous substances kill340,000 per year, with a single substance, asbestos,accounting for 100,000 of those. Exposure to dailyoccupational hazards such as dust, chemicals,noise, and radiation cause untold suffering and ill-ness, including cancers, heart disease, and strokes.

According to the ILO, at least half of the deathsfrom accidents could be prevented by safe workingpractices, and all accidents are avoidable and pre-ventable. Agriculture, construction, and miningare the three most hazardous occupations in bothdeveloping and industrialized countries.

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NEW HEALTH AND SAFETY GUIDELINES APPROVED

fforts to improve safety and health at workhave been given a major boost by new ILO

Guidelines on Occupational Safety and HealthManagement Systems. Several years in the mak-ing, the new standards aim to make health andsafety part of mainstream line management

In many developing countries, the number ofoccupational accidents and diseases are increas-ing, with standards and policies for dealing with theproblem varying greatly between countries. As wellas the obvious human toll, there is a large econ-omic cost; such accidents and diseases are esti-mated to amount to 4 per cent of the world’s grossnational product.

The new ILO Guidelines on Occupational Safetyand Health Management Systems aim to do some-thing about this. The Guidelines were organized bythe ILO SafeWork Programme and, following a longperiod of consultation and discussion, wereapproved by a tripartite meeting of experts and theILO Governing Body.

The Guidelines aim to encourage good practiceat two distinct levels:

Firstly, at a national level, they seek to ensure

that there are competent bodies to formulatenational policy, and that the latter can also be tai-lored to organizations based on their size and thenature of their activities.

Secondly, at the level of the organization, theGuidelines try to ensure that occupational healthand safety are integrated into the regular manage-ment structure, rather than being relegated to aseparate department or specialist.

The emphasis is on avoiding a one-size-fits-allmodel, but instead on making sure the more gener-al themes – policy, organizing, planning and imple-mentation, evaluation, and action for improvement– are made appropriate for each individual organi-zation. The aim is to avoid burdensome bureau-cracy, but at the same time to have the policies andpractices in place to ensure that workers’ healthand safety are properly protected.

For further information on ILO-OSH, please contact: SafeWork, ILO, 4, route des Morillons CH-1211Geneva 22, SwitzerlandTel: +4122/799-6715; Fax: + 4122/799-6878E-mail: [email protected] Web site: www.ilo.org/safework

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New research shows workplaceviolence threatens health servicesworldwide

The research was commissioned by a joint pro-gramme on workplace violence in the health sec-tor, organized by the International Labour Office(ILO), the International Council of Nurses (ICN),the World Health Organization (WHO), and Pub-lic Services International (PSI). The results, pre-sented to an informal technical consultation heldin Geneva from 23 to 26 April 2002, revealed aproblem affecting significant proportions of theworkforce.

In Thailand, for example, the percentage of staffexperiencing violence was 54 per cent, in Lebanon47 per cent. Such high levels were just not restrict-ed to developing countries; in Portugal the inci-dence was found to reach 60 per cent, and in SouthAfrica 61 per cent. Many health workers reportedthat violence in the streets is “spilling over” into thehospitals.

WHO IS AFFECTED, AND WHAT ISBEING DONE ABOUT IT?

According to the research, workplace violenceaffects all health workers, both women and men,though some are more at risk than others. Ambu-lance staff was cited as having to deal with “very

high” levels of exposure to violence, with nursesand physicians also reporting high exposure.

The research also highlighted the key interrela-tionship between stress and violence. In somecases, after experiencing a violent incident, approx-imately two-thirds of victims suffered from symp-toms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

In addition, stress resulting from health systemsbeing restructured was seen as a major contribut-ing factor to workplace violence.

Despite the scale of the problem, in most of thecountries studied there were no specific workplacepolicies to prevent or respond to workplace vio-lence. This resulted in under-reporting of inci-dents, poor follow-up of reported incidents, nosanctions taken against the perpetrators, and dis-satisfied victims.

To try to improve the situation theILO/ICN/WHO/PSI joint programme has draftedguidelines taking a “preventive, remedial, partici-pative, and systematic approach”. Strategies includeworkplace violence recognition, risk assessment,intervention, monitoring, and evaluation.

For more informationILO: Gabriele Ullrich, [email protected] ICN: Mireille Kingma, [email protected] WHO: Naeema Al-Gasseer, [email protected] PSI: Alan Leather, [email protected]

New research indicates that violence inthe health care workplace is actually aglobal phenomenon. According to thenew data, such violence occurs acrossborders, cultures, work settings, andoccupational groups, and represents“an epidemic” in all societies. Morethan half of the health sector person-nel surveyed for the new study hadexperienced at least one incident ofphysical or psychological violence inthe previous year.

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GENEVA – ILO monitors working inCambodian garment factories haveannounced that they have found no evi-dence of forced labour or discrimina-tion, but have uncovered problemsinvolving sexual harassment, freedom ofassociation, and the payment of wagesand overtime hours.

The findings are set out in a recentlypublished ILO report – the Second Syn-thesis Report on the Working ConditionsSituation in Cambodia’s Garment Sector– which contains an overview of themonitoring of 34 factories under a tech-nical cooperation project set up follow-ing an agreement between the Govern-ments of Cambodia and the UnitedStates.

The First Synthesis Report1 by ILOmonitors, released in November 2001,produced similar “good news and badnews” on working conditions in the ini-tial 30 factories investigated.

On the good-news front, the latestreport found that there is no evidence offorced labour or discrimination, and no

evidence of child labour, with the excep-tion of one minor instance.

However, it also highlighted thatincorrect payment of wages occurs fre-quently and that overtime work is not,or not always, undertaken voluntarily ata substantial number of factories. Inaddition, strikes are not always organ-ized in conformity with legally requiredprocedures, and there has been sexualharassment reported in three work-places.

The report argues that the monitoringof factories “is not an objective in itselfbut part of a process aimed at improvingworking conditions in Cambodia’s gar-ment sector as a whole.”

The latest three-year Trade Agreementon Textiles and Apparel offers a possible18 per cent annual increase in Cambo-dia’s export entitlements to the UnitedStates, provided the government ofCambodia supports the “implementa-tion of a programme to improve work-ing conditions in the textile and apparelsector, including internationally recog-

nized core labour standards, through theapplication of Cambodian labour law”.

The Project Advisory Committee(PAC) – comprising representativesfrom the Cambodian government, theGarment Manufacturers’ Association,and trade unions – endorsed the secondreport and said it was pleased that forcedlabour and discrimination, with theexception of a limited number of casesof sexual harassment, were not mattersof concern in the factories surveyed.

The Committee noted, “with satisfac-tion”, that “with the exception of oneminor incident, there was no evidence ofchild labour”, but also acknowledged,“with concern”, the violation of tradeunion rights in a number of factories.

The factories monitored did notinclude any of the 30 factories covered inthe first report; information on theprogress made in implementing the pro-ject’s suggestions for these factories isexpected to be published before the endof June.

ILO gives mixed verdict on working conditionsin the Cambodian garment industry

he International Confer-ence on Financing forDevelopment took place inMonterrey, Mexico, 18-22March 2002. Behind the

plethora of acronyms (ODA, FDI,NEPAD) lay a truly global challenge –

how to ensure that a greater proportionof the world’s population shares in itsprosperity – a debate on which the ILOis seeking a significant input.And whilethe outcome and value of Monterreyare hotly contested, few doubt theimportance of the issues at stake.

GENEVA - One in four children inthe world today lives in abject poverty;that is, in families surviving on anincome of less than US$1 a day. Of the130 million children born this year, 23million will never go to school, and 10million will die before they reach the age

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1 First Synthesis Report on the Working Conditions Situation in Cambodia’s Garment Sector, can be found at: www.ilo.org/public/english/dia-

logue/govlab/cambodia/cambodia.htm.

Monterrey: Developing a wealth of ideas totackle the poverty of nations

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of five, most from preventable causes.These are some of the stark statistics

of poverty which formed a backdrop tothe International Conference onFinancing for Development – the firstUnited Nations-hosted Conference tospecifically address key financial anddevelopment issues.

The Conference was huge; in atten-dance were 50 Heads of State or Gov-ernment and over 200 ministers, as wellas leaders from the private sector andcivil society, and senior officials of all themajor intergovernmental financial,

trade, economic, and monetary organi-zations.

It marked the first quadripartiteexchange of views between govern-ments, civil society, the business com-munity, and the institutional stakehold-ers, on global economic issues. Thesediscussions involved over 800 partici-pants in 12 separate roundtables, with afurther 55 side events taking place dur-ing the Conference week.

For the ILO, Monterrey representedan opportunity to ensure that the socialdimension of finance is duly acknowl-

edged, and that decent work appears onthe agenda of international financialinstitutions. The “Monterrey Consen-sus” document which was endorsed bythe governments included text proposedby the ILO.

The Conference also represented achance to hear the views of a wide rangeof groups on the social aspects of glob-alization, a topic currently being exam-ined by the ILO special Commission setup earlier this year. Its conclusions willno doubt help inform such events in thefuture.

WORKERS GET NEW TOOLS TO INVESTIGATE HEALTH FEARS

onventional wisdom says occupa-tional health research should only

be conducted on behalf of the employerby health professionals. A new guidepublished by the ILO InFocus Programmeon Socio-Economic Security, is challeng-ing this by showing workers how theythemselves can identify, investigate, andact on health and safety problems in theworkplace, and increase their basicsocioeconomic security.

GENEVA – Titled Barefoot Research: Aworkers’ manual for organizing on worksecurity, the guide sets out to demon-strate the techniques workers can use inorder to conduct their own health andsecurity related research, collect andanalyse the information gained, andtransform the results into action toimprove their health. Equally important, italso aims to raise awareness of workers’basic security, and how this can be inves-tigated and improved.

An abstract book this is not. Page afterpage contains specific and practicalmeasures which can be taken on a wholehost of security concerns, whether con-ducting health-related surveys at shop-floor level, checking hazard data sheets,negotiating with employers, or organizing

for workplace improvements. The meas-ures are designed so they can be carriedout with limited financial and technicalresources.

While a health research guide specifi-cally focusing on workers may be novel,the actual techniques used have beensuccessfully implemented across theworld, in both developed and developingcountries. Part of the reason for this is thegrowing realization that it is workersthemselves who often spot problems first.According to Ellen Rosskam, the ILOSenior Work Security Specialist, “themajority of work-related diseases havebeen identified first by workers, oftenusing any number of these ‘barefoot’, oralternative research techniques.”

Well-known diseases, such as asbesto-sis (caused by asbestos, which is com-mon in insulation products), silicosis (sili-ca is common in mining and sandblasting), and lead poisoning (lead iscommon in battery plants and paint facto-ries), were first recognized and highlight-ed by workers, with employers and themedical establishment lagging behind.

According to conservative estimates,there are 250 million work-related acci-dents and 160 million work-related dis-eases each year, with such accidents and

diseases claiming the lives of approxi-mately 2 million workers worldwide.

The manual thus argues that employeeparticipation in protecting workers’ secu-rity is essential: “It would take years foran army of scientists to evaluate everypossible workplace health hazard. Thereare, for example, over 50,000 chemicals incommon industrial use, and only a smallpercentage have been fully studied fortheir human health impact.”

According to Guy Standing, Director ofthe ILO Socioeconomic Security Pro-gramme, there is also an important politi-cal reason for workers and unions to con-duct their own research. “Information israrely neutral, and it is rarely appropriateto rely on others to collect, analyse anddisseminate information on which prac-tices and policies should be based.”

For a copy of the manual, or for moreinformation, contact the InFocus Pro-gramme on Socioeconomic Security; phone: +4122/799-8893, fax: +4122/799-7123, e-mail [email protected] or seewww.ilo.org/ses

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ILO APPOINTS INTERIM LIAISON OFFICER IN MYANMAR

The Governing Body concluded its 283rd

Session in March, following two weeks ofdiscussions over issues including forcedlabour in Myanmar, the impact of global-ization, and the employment situation inAfghanistan. The Governing Body wel-comed an understanding reachedbetween the International Labour Officeand Myanmar to appoint a liaison officerin the country by June of this year.

The issue of the ILO presence in Myan-mar has been considered as key forassisting the Government in its effortstowards eliminating forced labour andassessing progress in this regard. Theestablishment of a liaison officer repre-sents a first step towards full ILO repre-sentation, which can make an effectivecontribution to eliminating forced labour. (For a full copy of the understanding, seeGB.283/5/3 at www.ilo.org.)

GLOBALIZATION ISSUESIn an address to the Working Party on

the Social Dimension of Globalization,Minister of Labour, Employment andSocial Security of Argentina, AlfredoAtanasof, said the pressing social issuesin his country had resulted from “policieswhich considered that the economyshould prevail over social concerns.” TheGovernment of Argentina signed a Mem-orandum of Understanding with the ILOfocused on poverty alleviation, thestrengthening of social security networks,and employment-creation programmes.

In an address to the Working Party,Mike Moore, Director-General of theWorld Trade Organization (WTO), spokeon the theme of “How trade liberalizationimpacts employment” (see text onwww.ilo.org). Mr. Moore welcomed theILO initiative to establish a World Commis-sion on the Social Dimension of Globaliza-tion, and the scope it offered to the WTOand ILO secretariats to continue theirexisting collaboration on trade liberaliza-tion and employment. He also reiteratedthe WTO commitment to the observanceof internationally recognized labour stan-dards, and its belief that the ILO was acompetent body to deal with these issues.The World Commission held its first meet-ing in Geneva on 25-26 March. (For more information on the Commission,see document GB.283/WP/SDG/3/1 atwww.ilo.org)

OTHER MATTERSThe Governing Body also reviewed the

annual reports required under the ILODeclaration on Fundamental Principlesand Rights at Work. The reports provide areview of the situation in countries whichhave not ratified one or more of the ILOfundamental Conventions. The Chairmanof the Governing Body, Mr. Alain LudovicTou, noted that the number of countriesfailing to file reports under the Declara-tion had dropped from 50 in 2000, to 11 thisyear. In the meantime, several countriesfrom the Gulf region, including Saudi Ara-bia, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates,Oman, and Qatar, have engaged in a dia-logue with the ILO, which led to a plan ofactivities to assure the respect of theprinciples of freedom of association andthe right to collective bargaining.

The Governing Body also agreed tofast-track efforts aimed at forging anagreement on a Protocol concerningimproved security for seafarers' identifi-cation. This instrument will be submitted

to the International Labour Conferencenext year. The new instrument willaddress the question of positive verifiableidentification of seafarers, set out the pur-pose for which the document is issuedand the procedures for its issuance, regu-late the requirements concerning physi-cal characteristics and measures toensure the unfalsifiable nature of the doc-ument, as well as procedures for monitor-ing and control. It will provide for theinclusion of additional information, suchas information on certification of seafar-ers. The adoption of a Code of Practice onSecurity, Safety and Health in Ports, willalso be pursued within the next year, sub-ject to resources being made available.

The Governing Body is the executivebody of the International Labour Office(the Office is the secretariat of the Orga-nization). It meets three times a year, inMarch, June, and November. It takesdecisions on ILO policy, decides the agen-da of the International Labour Confer-ence, adopts the draft Programme andBudget of the Organization for submissionto the Conference, and elects the Direc-tor-General. It is composed of 56 titularmembers (28 Governments, 14 Employers,and 14 Workers) and 66 deputy members(28 Governments, 19 Employers, and 19Workers). Ten of the titular governmentseats are permanently held by States ofchief industrial importance (Brazil, China,France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, theRussian Federation, the United Kingdom,and the United States). The other Govern-ment members are elected by the Confer-ence every three years. They are current-ly: Algeria, Burkina Faso, Canada, Chad,Croatia, Ethiopia, Ghana, Guatemala, theIslamic Republic of Iran, the Republic ofKorea, Malaysia, Namibia, Peru, SaudiArabia, Slovakia, Switzerland, Trinidadand Tobago, and Venezuela.

Governing Body hold 283rd Session

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A REGULAR REVIEW OF THE INTERNATIONAL LABOURORGANIZATION AND ILO-RELATED ACTIVITIES AND EVENTSTAKING PLACE AROUND THE WORLD.

Bleak future forAsian youth?

■ Since May 2001, the ILO hasbeen involved in the Republic ofSerbia helping the tripartite con-stituents to reactivate national socialdialogue, which had come to astandstill. This work is supported byan Italian-funded project aimed atstrengthening social dialogue andtripartism. A first workshop held inBelgrade in May 2001, broughttogether for the first time the gov-ernment and representatives ofworkers’ and employers’ organiza-tions. It was a unique opportunityto discuss the fundamental role ofsocial dialogue in building consen-sus on economic and social policiesin this crucial period of transitiontowards democracy and a marketeconomy. This was followed by ahigh-level tripartite conference inFebruary 2002, where the tripartiteconstituents identified the obstaclesto effective tripartite social dialoguein the Republic of Serbia, andagreed on proposals on how toaddress them. Experts from the ILOand the Economic and Social Coun-cils of Ireland, Italy, and Portugaltook part in this conference, andshared their experiences of tripartitesocial dialogue with the constituentsof the Republic of Serbia. Theseefforts culminated in the officiallaunch in Belgrade on 15 April 2002,of the Agreement on the Improve-ment of the Economic and SocialCouncil, which was formally signedby the tripartite partners in thepresence of the Prime Minister ofthe Republic of Serbia, Dr. ZoranDjindjic.

For further information, please contactthe InFocus Programme on Strength-ening Social Dialogue,phone: +4122/799-7035 fax: +4122/799-8749 e-mail: [email protected]

■ Jobless youth in Asia and thePacific make up over 50 per cent, or33 million people, of the global figureof 66 million young men and womenwho are unemployed worldwide.Governments in the region may facewaves of unrest, crime and vandalismif they fail to reduce youth unemploy-ment, which has reached “unprece-dented” levels, the ILO warned at atripartite meeting held in Bangkok on27 February – 1 March. High and ris-ing youth unemployment is particu-larly alarming in Sri Lanka (29 percent), the Philippines (25 per cent),the Republic of Korea (15 per cent),and recession-plagued Japan (10 percent). The meeting was jointly spon-sored by the ILO and the Governmentof Japan and was a follow-up to therecommendations made recently bythe High-Level Panel on YouthEmployment Network composed ofthe United Nations, the World Bank,and the ILO.

For further information, please contactthe ILO Regional Office for Asia andthe Pacific, in Bangkok,phone: +662/288-1710fax: +662/280-1735 e-mail: [email protected]

have agreed with the ILO to startprojects to improve respect for free-dom of association and the right tocollective bargaining. Workers inSaudi Arabia are now able to defendtheir rights through committees atthe workplace. After a visit to SaudiArabia earlier this year by a team ofILO experts, the Saudi Minister ofLabour, Dr. Ali Al-Namlah, signedinto law new labour rules whichallow workers in Saudi Arabia – bothnational and foreign – to establishcommittees to guard their interestsat workplaces where 100 or morepersons are employed. In Bahrain,the ILO has provided similar techni-cal assistance in helping workers’committees move to full trade unionstatus. ILO Director-General JuanSomavia visited Bahrain and SaudiArabia in October 2001, and signeda cooperation agreement with thelabour Ministers of the Gulf States,under which these countries willbenefit from ILO technical pro-grammes to promote core ILO stan-dards in the fields of trade unionrights, forced labour, child labour,and equal opportunities. Notingthese agreements during its reviewof annual reports under the Declara-tion on Fundamental Principles andRights at Work, the ILO GoverningBody observed at its March 2002Session that only 11 countries failedto file reports this year, comparedwith 50 in 2001.

■ Several Gulf States, includingSaudi Arabia, Bahrain, the UnitedArab Emirates, Oman, and Qatar,

Improved rights forGulf States workers

A R O U N D T H E C O N T I N E N T S

A R O U N D T H E C O N T I N E N T S

Re-launch of economic and socialcouncil in the Republic of Serbia

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New protection forship workers

■ Seafarers will gain new protec-tion when two ILO instruments takeeffect in the next few months. The1996 Protocol to the MerchantShipping (Minimum Standards)Convention, (No.147), 1976 will, forthe first time, allow countries toinspect ships solely because of con-cerns over hours of work based onan international Convention.Inspections for hours of work andother issues covered in the Appen-dices to the Protocol, will be legaleven on ships which are sailingunder the flag of a country that hasnot ratified the Convention or theProtocol. The ILO Seafarers’ Hoursof Work and the Manning of ShipsConvention, (No.180), 1996 setsmaximum work hours and mini-mum rest time on board vessels.

For further information, please contactthe ILO Maritime Activities Team,phone: +4122/799-7501,fax: +4122/799-7050,e-mail: [email protected]

and urged the Government to inves-tigate the incidents and take steps toend the violence. Regarding Zim-babwe, the panel urged the Govern-ment to start an independent inves-tigation into the assault on a tradeunion leader and acts of arsoninvolving union offices. The super-visory body urged the Korean Gov-ernment to improve workers’ rightsand amend legislation to align itwith the principles of freedom ofassociation. The Committee alsourged the Government to dropcharges and release detainees arrest-ed for trade union activities. Com-mittee members examined a total of33 cases at their meeting on 7 to 9March 2002.

For further information, please contactthe ILO Freedom of AssociationBranch, phone: +4122/799-7122,fax: +4122/799-7670,e-mail: [email protected]

Appeals to Colombia,Zimbabwe, Republicof Korea■ The ILO Committee on Free-dom of Association noted noprogress in Colombia with respectto violence against trade unionists,

Jobs needed inAfghanistan■ Afghanistan’s political stabilitydepends on the interim Govern-ment’s ability to create jobs for for-mer fighters, returning refugees, andthe poor. During his visit to Genevain March 2002, Mir Wais Sadeq, thecountry’s Minister of Labour andSocial Affairs, appealed to donors forfunds to provide jobs and training inthe devastated country, where one infour workers is unemployed. The ILOis seeking US$19 million to financeinitial training and income-generat-ing projects in Afghanistan. Mr Sadeqalso discussed the opening of an ILOoffice in Kabul, and future ILO col-laboration with the interim Govern-ment, including a number ofemployment programmes developedby the ILO. Projects aimed at retrain-ing women for the labour market are

Training for factorymanagers

■ The ILO has begun a project inSri Lanka to improve apparel factorymanagement practices in support ofcore labour standards. Starting withten factories in the Colombo area,the programme will eventually becarried out in five countries, stretch-ing from Asia to Latin America andfocusing on management/workerrelations, working conditions, andhuman resources techniques andtheir linkages to productivity. Calledthe Local Management Develop-ment/Factory Improvement Project,the programme is designed to helplocal managers balance core businessobjectives with corporate socialresponsibilities. The project is part ofa major technical cooperation effortto promote core labour rights underthe 1998 ILO Declaration on Funda-mental Principles and Rights atWork. It will also serve as a pilot proj-ect for the ILO Management andCorporate Citizenship Programme

an essential component of the ILO“Jobs for Peace” strategy. The ILOoffice in Kabul has opened recentlywithin the UNDP compound.

For further information, please contactthe InFocus Programme on Crisis andReconstruction, phone: +4122/799-7069, fax: +4122/799-6189, e-mail:[email protected]

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Sport for developmentand peace■ In 2001, UN Secretary-GeneralKofi Annan appointed Adolf Ogi,former President of Switzerland, asSpecial Adviser on Sport for Devel-opment and Peace, to create part-nerships between sports organiza-tions and the UN. A first meetingconvened by the Special Adviser inNovember 2001, allowed the nineattending UN agencies, includingthe ILO, to take stock of existinginitiatives and move towards acoherent approach to sports initia-tives across the UN system.

In accordance with Mr. Ogi, theILO programme for decent workthrough training and innovation,more commonly known as Universi-tas, set up a mission in Mozambiquein April 2002. The ILO mission wasmeant to define how sport could beused in support of social and eco-nomic integration programmes, andits possible use in educational, voca-tional, and productive/income gen-erating dimension.

The mission followed a requestto the UN system from Mozam-bique’s Minister of Youth and Sport,made in October 2001, for advisoryservices towards the drafting of anational plan of action on access tosports facilities and services, andexpertise on sports-related small andmicroenterprises development.

Types of joint activities with UNand non-UN organizations, bilateral

donors, universities and other train-ing institutions, civil society andrepresentatives from the corporateworld involved in sports industriesand management, had to be definedas well.

An important role can be playedby nationally based programmes,particularly with respect to LocalEconomic Development (LED) andthe UNDP Anti-Poverty PartnershipInitiatives (APPI) programme.Interaction between different inter-agency programmes, could beinspired by the initiatives of the UNSecretary-General on Youth Em-ployment, involving the WorldBank, the ILO and other UN agen-cies.

An international partnership hasbeen established with non-govern-mental organizations and entitiesintervening in the field of sports,such as the International OlympicCommittee (IOC), Olympic Aid, theWorld Federation of the SportingGoods Industry (WFSGI), and theInternational Volley-Ball Federation(FIVB), as well as universities.

The University of Grenoble willcontribute by studying the linksbetween economic activities at themacro level and socioeconomiceffects at the local level. Olympic Aidwill provide coaching for education,sports and health for youth for aperiod of 3 years, while WFSGI andFIVB have proposed to providesports equipment.

Universitas will ensure trainingfor local and national developmentleaders, and help to set up a compre-hensive national awareness-raisingcampaign on the use of sports forsocial and economic integration.

The ILO and sports

In recent years, the ILO has launched anumber of initiatives using sports to promoteits goals. Following the launch of the “RedCard to Child Labour” campaign at theAfrican Cup of Nations, on 18 January 2002(see World of Work, No. 42), the ILO plans topursue the initiative in Latin America, Asia,and Europe.

SOLVE, a programme developed by the ILOSafework Programme to tackle psychologicalproblems at work arising from alcohol anddrugs, violence, stress, tobacco, andHIV/AIDS, was designed to allow an organiza-tion or an enterprise to integrate psychosocialissues into overall corporate policy, and estab-lish a framework for preventive action. In Jan-uary 2002, a meeting of the 2004 OrganizingCommittee of the 2004 Athens OlympicGames (ATOC) with representatives from theILO Safe Work and Universitas programmes,discussed the eventual use of the SOLVEmethodology in preparation for the 2004Olympic Games.

The ILO has also established a solid partner-ship with the World Federation of the Sport-ing Goods Industry (WFSGI), in Verbier,Switzerland. This cooperation emerged out ofthe ILO International Programme on theElimination of Child Labour (IPEC) action toremove children from the production of soc-cer balls in Sialkot, Pakistan. WFSGI played akey role in creating support for this initiativeamong multinational companies involved inthe production of sporting goods.

Another ILO project to promote coopera-tives in sports in Guinea Bissau in cooperationwith the International Olympic Committee(IOC), has been proposed to the donor com-munity recently.

on the effectiveness of low-cost,high-impact training on workingconditions in individual factories.

For further information, please con-tact the Management and CorporateCitizenship Branch, phone:+4122/799-6512, fax: +4122/799-7050, e-mail: [email protected]

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F E A T U R E S



Too Young to Work: The Worst Forms of Child Labour

Doc. BIT WOW n°43 09.07.2002 10:48

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Articles have been excerpted and are not always in the exact format in which they appear originally. They are trimmed and rearranged sometimes, for space reasons.


ILO Director-General, Juan Somavia speaking on Child Labour on CNN

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112416-9. Price: 20 Swiss Francs.A future without child labour, thethird Global Report under the followup to the ILO Declaration on Funda-mental Principles and Rights atWork, shows how the abolition ofchild labour has become a globalcause for the new millennium. Itexplores the ever-changing manifes-tations of child labour throughout theworld, and how girls and boys areaffected differently; it presents newdata on the scale of this stubbornproblem; and it sheds new light on itscomplex, interlinked causes. Itcharts the growth of a global move-ment against child labour, reviewingthe various types of action beingtaken by the ILO, its tripartite con-stituents (governments, employers’and workers’ organizations), andother actors at international, nation-al, and local levels.

The report concludes with pro-posals for a three-pillar approach tostrengthen the action of the ILO inthis field, building upon the wealth ofexperience gained by the Interna-tional Programme on the Eliminationof Child Labour (IPEC) in the decadesince its establishment.

A future without child labourdemonstrates that many of the build-ing blocks to achieve the goal of theeffective abolition of child labour arein place and that progress is beingmade. However, much remains to bedone.

■ Every ChildCounts. New GlobalEstimates on ChildLabour. ILO, Geneva,2002. ISBN 92-2-113113-0.

Every Child Counts sets out the fullstatistical methodologies and prac-

tices used to produce the globalchild labour estimates and other fig-ures contained in the Global Reporton Child Labour. It contains detailedexplanations of the methodologyused in producing the estimates, andsets out the definitions and distinc-tions that underpin the data.

It is intended to serve both theinterested public and professionalsin the field of child labour studies.

■ The Committee onFreedom of Associa-tion: Its impact over 50years. ILO, Geneva,2001. ISBN 92-2-112667-6.

The Committee on Freedom of Asso-ciation (CFA) of the Governing Bodyof the ILO recently celebrated its50th anniversary. To mark the occa-sion, this book focuses on the Com-mittees impact over the period – themanner in which it has carried out itssupervisory role, and its influence onthe implementation of ILO standardsand principles in the field of freedomof association.

The first section is devoted to thehistorical background and functionsof the CFA while the second andmore empirical section endeavoursto assess its impact by examiningthe cases of progress from the pastquarter of a century. The book alsoseeks to identify, where possible,lessons for the future.

■ “Our Project” Par-ticipatory Project Plan-ning and Evaluation forand by Indigenous andTribal Peoples. ILO,2001, Geneva. ISBN 92-2-112540-8.

The estimated 300 million indigenous

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■ Fundamental Prin-ciples of OccupationalHealth and Safety. Ben-jamin O. Alli, ILO, Gene-va, 2001. ISBN 92-2-110869-4. Price: 20

Swiss Francs.At a time of increased awareness ofthe need to combat occupationalaccidents and diseases, this topicalbook provides vital information onnational laws, labour codes and reg-ulations governing workers’ healthand safety.It also explores the main concepts inoccupational health and demon-strates how relevant ILO Conven-tions and Recommendations defineworkers’ rights and allocate dutiesand responsibilities to competentauthorities, employers and workers.It considers the respective roles ofemployers and workers in the man-agement of occupational health andsafety, and gives examples of goodpractice on such pivotal issues assurveillance of workers’ health andof the working environment, thefunctions of occupational healthservices, and ways of reducing theincidence of work-related injuriesand diseases.

The volume provides a wealth ofpractical advice for authorities,employers and workers alike, alongwith a glossary, a list of related pub-lications and an example of a healthand safety policy.

■ A future withoutchild labour. GlobalReport under the Fol-low-up to the ILO Dec-laration on Fundamen-tal Principles andRights at Work 2002.

ILO, Geneva, 2002. ISBN 92-2-

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and tribal peoples (ITPs) belong tothe most marginalized and impover-ished communities of the world. TheINDISCO programme is designed tosupport ITPs and their organizationsin implementing their own develop-ment plans and initiatives.Our Project is the fifth in a series ofguidelines and deals with proceduresof participatory project planning, imple-mentation, evaluation and phasing-outfrom programmes assisting indigenousand tribal peoples’ organizations. Thelast two parts on participatory self-evaluation and end-of-project proce-dures have been tested separately sev-eral times since 1996 by INDISCOprojects in India, the Philippines, Thai-land and Vietnam.

■ HIV/AIDS and theworld of work. ILOcode of practice. ILO,Geneva, 2002. ISBN 92-2-111633-6. Price: 20Swiss francs.

The code is aimed at preventing thespread and mitigating the impact ofHIV/AIDS in the world of work. It isbuilt on and around two pillars, thefirst – which is at the heart of all theILO’s work – is the protection ofworkers against discrimination. Thesecond is prevention: the workplaceis not only an appropriate but anessential place for HIV/AIDS infor-mation, education and behaviouralchange. The code provides invalu-able guidance to policy-makers,organizations and the social partnersfor forming effective and appropriateworkplace and national policy thatrespects the dignity of all workers.

M E D I A S H E L F

The code covers the key princi-ples surrounding HIV/AIDS, such asthe recognition of HIV/AIDS as aworkplace issue, the role of socialdialogue, the gender dimension,confidentiality, screening and test-ing, and adapting jobs and work-places to the capacities of workerswith HIV related sickness. It looks atthe specific responsibilities of gov-ernments and workers’ and employ-ers’ organizations, and includesmeasures for education, care andsupport, and training for all thosewith workplace responsibilities.

With the objective of promotingdecent work in the face of theHIV/AIDS epidemic, this codeapplies to all working men andwomen and to all types of work, paidor unpaid, in the formal and informalsectors.

■ I n t e r n a t i o n a lLabour Standards. Aglobal approach. 75th

anniversary of theCommittee of Expertson the Application of

Conventions and Recommendations.ILO, 2001. ISBN 92-2-112668-4. The purpose of this publication by theInternational Labour Standards Depart-ment of the ILO is both modest andambitious. Since they are at the serviceof constituents, namely governments,employers and workers, it is the wish ofthe authors to present the ILO’s stan-dards to constituents in an accessible,but technically sound manner.

Accordingly, an analysis is pro-vided in the publication, firstly, of themain content of all the ILO Conven-

tions and Recommendations whichrespond to current needs, in accor-dance with the successive decisionstaken in the context of the Organiza-tion’s new standards policy. Second-ly, reference is made to the contentof instruments which are to berevised. It should be added thatinstruments deemed to be outdatedare not directly analysed.

A presentation of standardsalone would not suffice for a properunderstanding of internationallabour law. It therefore appearedindispensable to indicate the resultsof the Committee of Experts’ work,which identifies essential criteriaand principles for assessing enu-merate briefly the problems in theapplication of Conventions whichare encountered most frequently innational law.

There is a similar presentationfor each chapter. It starts with atable presenting the relevant Con-ventions and Recommendations inthe context of the Organization’s newstandards policy. The content of thestandards is then described, togetherwith the principles identified by theCommittee of Experts (derived in themain from General Surveys). A finalsection indicates, where appropri-ate, the most frequent problemsencountered in the application of thesestandards in the various countries.

ILO publications for sale can be obtained through major booksellers or ILO local offices in many countries, or directly from ILO Publications, International Labour Office, 4 route des Morillons, CH-1211Geneva 22, Switzerland. Tel: +4122/799-7828; fax: +4122/799-6938; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: http//www.ilo.org/publns. Catalogues or lists of new publications are available free of charge fromthe above address. The ILO Publications Center in the US can be contacted at tel: +301/638-3152; fax: +301/843-0159; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: http://www.un.org/depts/ilowbo.

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