Jobs in the chemical industries in East Asia have more than doubled over the last two decades, while the size of the workforce gradually declined throughout the sector in most regions of the world, according to the new ILO report Best practices in work-flexibility schemes and their impact on the quality of working life in the chemical industries.

World employment in the production of industrial chemicals fell from a peak in 1994, slightly exceeding 9 million employees worldwide to 7.9 million in 1997. In contrast, employment increased in most parts of East Asia over the past two decades, growing from 2.4 million in 1980 to 6.1 million in 1995. China more than doubled its chemical employment over the last 20 years from about 1.8 million in 1980 to about 5.4 million in 1999.

Employment in Europe slumped in five years from a peak in 1992 at about 1.9 million employees to about 1.2 million in 1997. The employment situation is particularly bleak in Central and Eastern Europe where employment in the chemical industries fell by 29-50 per cent in Albania, Bulgaria, Croatia, Macedonia, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia.

The report was discussed at a tripartite meeting on 27-31 October, which reviewed such issues as the balance between employment security and work flexibility, increased female participation in the workforce, training and skills development, stress and fatigue and industrial relations in the sector.

The European chemical industry has shifted to more profitable specialty products and increased productivity. This allowed unit labour costs to remain relatively stable, while both labour costs per employee and productivity have increased by about 50 per cent in the past decade.

The ageing of the workforce is a concern and some companies are finding it hard to transmit skills to younger workers. In the United States, the average age of all chemists rose from 41.3 years in 1990 to 45.1 years in 2002. In Japan, the number of workers over 50 years old increased from 12.8 per cent in 1984 to 21.7 per cent in 1994.

Except for the transition countries, many workers in the chemical industries have enjoyed real wage increases in recent years. They often earn more than their counterparts in other industries because of the higher training requirements. Salaries for chemists and chemical engineers steadily increased over the past ten years.

About 93 per cent of organized chemical workers in 42 major chemical producing countries worked less than 40 hours a week. Workers in Africa, Asia, Latin America and transition countries tend to work longer hours than European workers. In 2000, the average number of annual working hours was 2,040.8, ranging between 1,665 in Denmark and 2,808 in Thailand. Continuous shift work is an imperative in the chemical industries.