ILO teams ups with NSSA to mitigate the effects of COVID-19 on informal economy work spaces

Recognizing the great challenge that governments, employers, workers and societies are facing worldwide to combat the COVID-19 pandemic, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) partnered with the National Social Security Authority (NSSA) on a project that is focusing on occupational safety and health for informal economy workers.

News | 22 February 2021
Contact(s): ILO Harare Office Tel +2634369806-12 Email: harare@lo.org
CHIVHU (ILO News) The ILO, in partnership with NSSA have identified informal economy workers markets in Bulawayo, Chinhoyi and Chivhu that will be capacitated with requisite knowledge on Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) and decent shelters to work from. The COVID-19 response programme seeks to reduce the risk of infection by the workers and customers.

Many studies have confirmed decent work deficits affecting the informal economy which pause a health and economic threat. A recent tour of Chivhu Food Market (142km from Harare on the Masvingo highway) revealed the urgent need for ablution facilities, as well as other amenities that are critical in preventing the spread of COVID-19.

The traders have failed to pay for pre-paid water which has resulted with no running water for immediate use at the market and the nearby public toilets servicing the market. The absence of water at a market that services the local community of about 10,300 people, as well as long distance buses and trucks, greatly compromises basic hygiene practices that are critical especially during this time of the deadly global health pandemic.

NSSA Chief OSH Officer, Dr Betty Nyereyegona noted that,
“For long, NSSA has been concentrating on the formal sector, yet the informal sector also required attention. The Authority realized that the informal sector needed to be equipped with the requisite knowledge on safety and health”.

She made an undertaking that the Authority will jointly work with the traders to come up with solutions to the challenges that are affecting them.

Councillor Christopher Muchenje from Chivhu, who is responsible for the area that covers the Food Market acknowledged the partnership between the ILO and NSSA. The Councillor is confident that the health threat, which has been worsened by COVID-19 can be overcome, if the market leadership - Council, NSSA and the ILO, plan together and implement the project.

This partnership with NSSA contributes to the UN joint programme on ‘Safe markets’ being implemented by the ILO with UNDP and UN Women, which seeks to empower vulnerable women marketers for recovery and resilience from socio-economic shocks, the impacts of COVID 19, in particular.