07 March 2011
As we celebrate the 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day we also remember the women who lost their lives in the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in New York in 1911. One hundred years on, despite some progress there is still much to be done to achieve gender equality in the world of work.
24 January 2011
With global unemployment at record highs for the third straight year since the start of the economic crisis, the International Labour Office (ILO) warned in its annual employment trends survey: 'Global Employment Trends 2011: The challenge of a jobs recovery', that weak recovery in jobs is likely to continue in 2011, especially in developed economies.
31 December 2010
Serbia was hit hard by the global economic crisis, particularly its young people, who are living a “crisis within the crisis”. Often what they learned in school doesn’t match what employers are looking for, making it hard for them to find work. It’s worse for young people who didn’t do well in school, or dropped out. But in Serbia, the government, trade unions and employers, working together, have designed new policy interventions to give young people, especially those with low levels of education, a chance to find a decent job and keep it.
15 December 2010
The global economic crisis has cut wage growth worldwide in half. That’s one conclusion of the ILO’s Global Wage Report. When people have less to spend, businesses suffer, and they in turn have to look at ways to cut costs, wages, and even jobs. But in Germany’s tightly run manufacturing sector, employees and employers worked together with the government to protect jobs and maintain wage levels during the darkest days of the crisis.
01 December 2010
It’s tough to be an entrepreneur; it’s a lot tougher when you’re a woman from a low income background, running a small scale enterprise across international borders. But in Malawi the challenges for pioneering women entrepreneurs also include the risk of HIV infection. That’s why a local business association is welcoming a new initiative to educate entrepreneurs how to protect themselves. And the classroom is an unconventional one; on board the bus to buy goods across the border in Tanzania.
01 December 2010
Guyana, a country with a population of around 750,000 has an HIV prevalence of 2.5 per cent in the age group of 15-49 which accounts for 52 per cent of the country's population. The epidemic in Guyana is considered generalized, and it is mainly a heterosexual epidemic. Despite the encouraging signs with regard to reducing HIV prevalence among most-at-risk populations, there is still much to do to tackle the problem of scant awareness of HIV/AIDS. That's why the Government of Guyana, through strong partnerships with employers and workers organizations are trying to increase the number of people being counselled and tested. Thanks to the support of the ILO, the United States Department of Labor (USDOL), the US President Emergency Fund for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and additional resources from the OPEC Fund for International Development (OFID), HIV/AIDS workplace education and prevention programmes are now reaching even the most remote areas of the country.
16 November 2010
Record unemployment is one of the consequences of the global economic crisis, but in Argentina, fewer jobs were lost in the crisis than in many other countries. A new report from the ILO found that’s because Argentina learned some lessons from a bitter experience in the past, and protected jobs when hard times came around again.
30 September 2010
The global economy is recovering but according to a report from the ILO, a labour market recession looms on the horizon if measures are not taken to ensure a job-rich recovery and a more equitable distribution of the gains from economic growth.
23 September 2010
In 2006 war devastated areas of Southern Lebanon. In recent years, the pace of reconstruction has been enhanced by a new program that trains young people at risk for long term unemployment in job skills in the building and construction industries. One of the brightest prospects from the new program is also one of the most unlikely; she’s on track to become southern Lebanon’s first woman electrician.
17 June 2010
Over a year ago ILO TV interviewed Sisana Buba, a supermarket cashier who was sick at home with an HIV-related illness. ILO TV returned to Swaziland recently to find Sisana feeling well and back at work. The supermarket where she works has a HIV/AIDS workplace policy. As a result Sisana hasn't suffered from discrimination from her colleagues, and has had access to anti-retroviral treatment. Developed with the help of the ILO, this kind of HIV/AIDS workplace policy is now going global, with the adoption of an international labour standard on HIV/AIDS in the world of work at the ILO's 99th International Labour Conference.