About the Office

The International Labour Organization was established in 1919, after the First World War, following the Treaty of Versailles. The International Labour Office is headed by a Director-General appointed by the Governing Body. Albert Thomas of France was the first Director-General of the ILO. The current Director-General, Juan Somavia, took office in March 1999.

The ILO is unique among the UN Organizations due to its tripartite structure; that is both the employers' and the workers' representatives have an equal voice with those of the governments in shaping its policies and programmes, resulting in meaningful cooperation amongst the social partners.

In 2003, the field offices of the ILO were restructured and Subregional Offices (SRO) established. In Asia, three SROs - Bangkok, Manila and New Delhi - became operational as of 1 April 2003.

The SRO-New Delhi, in close collaboration with the Country Offices/Liaison Office in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka, is responsible for programme, planning and implementation of ILO activities in these countries besides being directly responsible for ILO activities in India and Islamic Republic of Iran. In the case of Pakistan, SRO-New Delhi provides only technical assistance. Activities in non-member countries in the region - Bhutan and Maldives - are carried out as and when requested.

The SRO-New Delhi provides technical guidance and advisory services on policy and technical issues related to labour and employment to the tripartite constituents of the ILO within the ILO's core mandate with the aim of promoting Decent Work. Further the SRO-New Delhi offers assistance in formulation and implementation of country strategies, programmes/projects for the ILO's social partners.

The SRO-New Delhi, provides technical advisory services in the following areas:

• Employment Strategies and Labour Market Policies: The overall objective of work in this field is to assist member states in identifying factors that impede employment promotion and poverty alleviation and in formulating plans and policies to achieve these goals.
• Small Enterprise and Management Development: The objective in this field is to assist member states in their efforts in promotion of small enterprises, entrepreneurship, development and improving the quality of management.
• Human Resource Development and Vocational Training: Work in this area aims at extending assistance to countries in formulating training strategies, policies and systems that would be capable of meeting the various challenges from poverty, unemployment, under-employment and industrial restructuring. Specific focus is on promoting access to formal training institutions for informal economy workers.
• Social Security: The basis objective of work in this field is to move towards broader and deeper coverage of social security schemes to expand the coverage to informal economy workers.
• Industrial Relations and Labour Administration: Technical assistance being provided in improving the industrial relations environment and strengthening labour administration by supporting the establishment of a framework for industrial relations that is consistent with international labour standards, promoting awareness and understanding of various means of preventing labour disputes, setting up effective dispute settlement mechanisms, promoting the application of collective bargaining mechanism, and in strengthening national systems of labour administration including labour inspection, employment services, and labour market information.
• Conditions of Work and Occupation Safety and Health: Within this field, assistance is being provided in improving working conditions through training programmes, promoting formulation of national policy on occupational safety health (OSH) and on major industrial hazard control, formulation/review of the legislative framework on OSH, and in strengthening the administration of OSH.
• International Labour Standards: The objective is to promote a greater understanding of ILS among the tripartite constituents and assist them in carrying out obligations in terms of the ILO constitution, provide guidance to governments in respect of the ratification of Conventions and the utilization of Recommendations, assist in improving the application of, and reporting of, ratified Conventions and strengthen the capacity of governments, employers' and workers' organizations for effective use of ILS.
• Rights at Work: The objective is to ensure that certain fundamental principles and rights of the worker are ensured and protected in the world of work. ILO's technical assistance is provided in areas of child labour; forced labour; in ensuring that there is no discrimination at the workplace; and, in promoting collective bargaining to provide voice and protect rights of the worker.
• Employers' Activities: Technical assistance is being provided in strengthening the Employers' Organizations (EO) to enable them to provide better services to their members in meeting the challenges posed by economic reforms; productivity measurement and improvement, improvement of OSH, vocational training and retraining and ILS. Work is being undertaken on an ongoing basis to strengthen the technical capacity of EOs in undertaking small business and management/supervisor training courses for members and to strengthen the EOs' capability in influencing policy making in labour and employment.
• Workers' Activities: The objective of work in this field is to promote trade union rights and ILS, develop and strengthen workers' organizations and education programmes, mobilize women workers into trade unions and strengthen the capability of the trade unions to respond to new challenges posed by economic reforms as well as technological changes.
• Women and Gender Issues: The objective of the work is to provide technical advisory services at the sectoral or programme level in the field of women and gender questions and assist the integration of gender concerns in the activities of the ILO, and the involvement of women as participants and beneficiaries of these activities, with particular emphasis on socio-economic issues on structural adjustment, privatization, democratization, tripartism, trade union's activities, employers' organizations' activities, employment, HRD, social security, migration, conditions of work, environment and occupational health and safety, while ensuring the related ILO projects and programmes address the needs of women.

Objectives

Towards achieving Decent Work through contribution towards achieving country-based outcomes identified in line with the national priorities and needs in the subregion (Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Islamic Republic of Iran, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka). These interventions will, in turn, address the Regional Priorities of the Member States in the Asia & Pacific Region.

Means of Action:

In undertaking its work the SRO-New Delhi utilizes a variety of means of action including diagnostic analysis, policy advice, training, workshops/seminars, and other means of exchange of information.

Crisis Response

Most of the countries in the subregion are affected by crisis - through natural calamity (tsunami, earthquake, floods - Bangladesh, India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka) and post-war situation/insurgency (Afghanistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka). Hence, post-crisis reconstruction in these countries and social and economic rehabilitation continue to remain a priority (e.g. The Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami disaster in December 2004 and earthquakes in Pakistan and India in 2005, have a profound impact on jobs and livelihoods in the subregion).