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2012
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ILO Chief: Global economy at turning point, time to rethink policies
02 July 2012
ILO Director-General Juan Somavia outlines measures to create decent jobs and preserve incomes for working families around the world.
2011
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Brazil launches unprecedented social dialogue process to promote employment and decent work
27 September 2011
Brazil has launched a series of conferences on job creation and decent work in an effort to promote social dialogue on a scale that is unprecedented anywhere in the world, said the ILO Regional Director for Latin America and the Caribbean, Elizabeth Tinoco.
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South Africa and the ILO team up to promote public employment and community work programmes
27 July 2011
With an official unemployment rate of 25 per cent, the South African government knows that employment creation cannot be left to the private sector alone. There is a huge gap between the jobs that are needed and the jobs that the market can generate. The State has the responsibility to fill that gap. Today South Africa has become a prime example of a country where public employment programmes (PEPs) and its Community Work Programme (CWP) are playing a key role in providing a minimum level of employment where markets are failing to do so. The CWP, although not universal in coverage, is being designed to test an employment guarantee.
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ILO presents Global Jobs Pact in Argentina
08 April 2011
At a tripartite meeting on the application in Argentina of the recommendations of the Global Jobs Pact, the ILO reported today that the urban unemployment rate in Latin America and the Caribbean is back to its pre-crisis level of 7.3 per cent.
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CDB-ILO symposium: Short and long term measures required for sustained post-crisis recovery
23 February 2011
ILO Decent Work Team and Office for the Caribbean
2010
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The ILO and the Millennium Development Goals: Questions and Answers
20 September 2010
Interview with Alice Ouedraogo, Deputy Director of the ILO's Policy Integration Department about the International Labour Organization's efforts to help achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), in particular the first MDG on eradicating extreme poverty and hunger.
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ILO-UN Social Protection Floor Initiative: The role of social security in crisis response and recovery, and beyond
16 June 2010
The crisis has reinforced the perception that the extension of social security should be a high priority. While in many developing countries social security systems were previously considered unaffordable, they are now regarded as important investments to support sustainable economic growth. Furthermore, in times of crisis, social security systems are playing an essential role as economic stabilizers. Interview with Michael Cichon, Director of the ILO’s Social Security Department, about the UN Social Protection Floor Initiative and social security in times of crisis.
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ILO and Australia sign first-ever partnership agreement
20 April 2010
The Government of Australia and the International Labour Organization (ILO) have signed a five-year Partnership Agreement that will provide $A15 million in the first two years to promote employment and decent work in the Asia-Pacific region.
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Media alert: ILO reports for G20 Employment and Labour Ministers meeting - 20-21 April, Washington DC
16 April 2010
In preparation for the G20 Employment and Labour Ministers meeting to be held in Washington D.C. on 20-21 April at the U.S. Department of Labor, the International Labour Organization (ILO) has produced a series of background reports on the evolving employment situation in the context of the global financial crisis.
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ILO seminar on ways out of the jobs crisis
26 March 2010
While the massive increase in unemployment due to the global economic crisis has left some countries reeling from joblessness and recession, others – including for the first time some less-developed and emerging economies – have experienced a much quicker and smoother recovery process.
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Economic sectors at a glance: Economic recovery yet to be translated into jobs (Q&A)
19 March 2010
The path for labour markets to return to pre-crisis levels remains long and signs of recovery in the economy are yet to be translated into jobs, says a new study by the ILO. The paper also shows how job losses are unequally distributed across regions and economic sectors, and between developed and developing countries. ILO Online spoke with Elizabeth Tinoco, Director of the ILO Sectoral Activities Department.
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Employers’ organizations responding to the impact of the crisis
17 February 2010
With the adoption of the Global Jobs Pact by the 183 member States of the ILO at the International Labour Conference in June 2009, the world’s governments, employers and workers have at their disposal an integrated portfolio of policies to address the global economic and social crisis. ILO Online spoke with Jean-François Retournard, Director of the ILO Bureau for Employers’ Activities, about a new report which shows that employers’ organizations played a major role in worldwide efforts to stem the crisis.
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ILO Director-General welcomes Business Leaders’ Declaration on International Trade and Economic Recovery at Davos
29 January 2010
ILO Director-General Juan Somavia welcomed a statement adopted by the International Business Council (IBC) of the World Economic Forum in Davos. The Business Leaders’ Declaration on International Trade and Economic Recovery urges heads of government to follow through on commitments made at recent high-level meetings, including the G20 Summit in Pittsburgh and support the need for 'a concerted effort to put decent jobs at the heart of the recovery'.
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Vulnerable employment and poverty on the rise, Interview with ILO chief of Employment Trends Unit
26 January 2010
The economic crisis has had a major impact throughout the world on the level of employment as well as its quality. The ILO’s annual report on "Global Employment Trends 2010" says the share of workers in vulnerable employment worldwide may have increased by more than 100 million in 2009, and with it global poverty. ILO Online spoke with Lawrence Jeffrey Johnson who directed the publication of the report.
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Questions and answers on jobs recovery and the development of decent work for people in the Pacific Islands
11 January 2010
In February 2010, at Port Vila, Vanuatu, Labour Ministers, Senior Labour officials and representatives of worker and employer organizations from all eight countries – Fiji, Kiribati, Papua New Guinea, Republic of Marshall Islands, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tuvalu and Vanuatu – as well as Australia and New Zealand – took part in the first high-level gathering of its kind. After two days of rich debate a tripartite accord was adopted – The Port Vila Statement on Decent Work and the Pacific Action Plan for Decent Work. ILO Online spoke to Ms. Sachiko Yamamoto, the ILO’s Regional Director for Asia and the Pacific about the accord and development plans in the Pacific.
2009
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Tripartism in the times of neoliberalism
18 December 2009
For much of the 1990s and the first half of the present decade, many developing countries seeking integration into the global economy adopted the type of market-oriented measures pushed forward by the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. Much has been written about the impact of these measures (known as the Washington Consensus) on governments, employers and workers in the developing world. Now a new book published by the International Labour Office (ILO) takes this issue forward and looks at how the process of consultation and negotiation between these three social partners – in other words, tripartism – altered the pace, sequence and content of these reforms. ILO Online spoke to the editor of "Blunting neoliberalism: Tripartism and economic reform in the developing world", Lydia Fraile.
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Green policies and jobs: a double dividend?
11 December 2009
Nearly 40 per cent of all jobs worldwide are in high carbon intensive sectors. If we want to arrest climate change, this will inevitably create an employment challenge as workers will have to move to different jobs and sectors. And it raises the question to what extent “green” policies can produce a double dividend, in terms of environmental and employment goals. Here are a series of questions and answers on climate change, green policies and jobs.
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Negotiating for social justice: Collective bargaining in times of crisis
19 November 2009
This year marks the 60th anniversary of ILO Convention No. 98 on the Right to Organize and Collective Bargaining. While much has changed since the Convention was adopted in 1949, collective bargaining remains a fundamental right, an important tool to improve incomes and working conditions, and advance social justice. ILO Online spoke with Susan Hayter, senior ILO industrial relations expert, about recent trends and innovations in collective bargaining worldwide, including responses to the economic crisis, discussed at an ILO meeting in Geneva this month.
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Brazil’s Foreign Minister calls for a job-intensive economic recovery
17 November 2009
Brazil’s Foreign Minister Celso Amorim said a new global governance was needed to protect the most vulnerable members of society from the adverse effects of the global economic crisis and called on the International Labour Organization (ILO) to continue to play a leading role in promoting a job-based recovery and a fairer globalization.