All news: informal employment + informal enterprises + informal economy

WESO Trends 2021

Slow jobs recovery and increased inequality risk long-term COVID-19 scarring

ILO projections highlight the danger of a COVID-19 labour market legacy of increased geographic and demographic inequality, rising poverty and fewer decent jobs.

ILO COOP participates in the Strategic Workshop “Toward an action plan to eliminate child labour and to promote decent work in solid waste...

Head of ILO’s COOP Unit highlighted the role that cooperatives play for informal waste-pickers to access social protection, generate negotiation power with public and private stakeholders and to formalize their work.

Is Asia ready for e-formalization?

Technology can play an important role bringing workers in the Asia-Pacific region into the formal sector. Sara Elder, Senior Economist at ILO’s Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific explains why.

Message at the Informal Sector Labour Day 2021

By Mr Khalid Hassan, Director, ILO Country Office for the Philippines at the Informal Sector Labour Day, 6 May 2021, Manila, Philippines via Zoom

ILO issues call for ideas and solutions to support e-formality through skills development in Latin America and the Caribbean

Skills development and innovation for reducing informality in the region is a key objective of this ILO call, which will provide financial and technical support to IT projects that boost formalization through the improvement of skills.

G20 Tourism Ministers’ Meeting

Protect workers and businesses in the tourism industry

ILO Deputy Director-General, Martha Newton, called on G20 countries to take action to support the travel and tourism industry, which has been hard hit by the COVID-19 pandemic. She was speaking at a virtual G20 Tourism Ministers’ meeting on 4 May,...

Launch of the Mazdoor Ka Ehsaas report- A social protection programme for workers in the informal economy

The Ehsaas Delivery Unit at the Poverty Alleviation and Social Safety Division and the ILO have jointly organised a webinar on May 1st, 2021 for the launch of MKE Report. The purpose of the webinar is to share steps taken for the actualisation of...

Building employment injury protection for platform workers

The ILO Country Office in Beijing and MOHRSS organized a Research Seminar on Employment Injury Insurance for Workers in the Platform Economy aimed at sharing experiences and providing recommendations for a national regulatory framework for...

Webinar: Informality and the transition to formality in forced displacement contexts

Video: Impact of COVID-19 on Employment and Labour Market in the Kyrgyz Republic. Results of the Rapid Assessment

The video summarises the results of the rapid assessment of COVID-19 employment and labour market impacts in Kyrgyzstan to appraise the current and expected effects of this social, economic and employment crisis, and propose policy responses for...

Protecting human rights of refugees and asylum seekers in the context of HIV and sexual orientation in Ukraine

Asylum seekers and refugees are entitled to all the rights and fundamental freedoms spelled out in international human rights instruments. This includes the right to protection if they have HIV, TB or identify themselves as lesbian, gay, bisexual,...

2021 Labour Overview Series

26 million jobs lost in Latin America and the Caribbean during pandemic

A new ILO analysis warns that "ambitious actions" are needed for the regional labour market to recover in 2021 – a year that began marked by new waves of contagion. The strong labour impact of COVID-19 was aggravated by pre-existing structural...

A knowledge exchange with ILO Ankara: Learning from each other and sharing experiences to support the creation of decent work opportunities...

The ILO Office in Turkey and the PROSPECTS programme jointly organized a webinar to exchange knowledge and experiences on how to foster an enabling environment for the socio-economic inclusion of refugees and vulnerable host community members.

COVID-19 and the World of Work

“We could all do with a bit of hope” – What the informal economies recovery project means for Tonga

This month we sat down with Mele Amanaki - Secretary General of the Tonga Public Service Association [TPSA] – a key partner in the Inclusive Economic Recovery through Sustainable Enterprises in the Informal Economies. She spoke about her role and...

COVID-19 and the World of Work

How a typical informal sector micro business is surviving

With informal employment accounting for more than half of all jobs in Fiji, Palau, Tonga and Vanuatu, it became clear that the hitherto ‘invisible sector,’ was going to be the biggest key to driving economic recovery across the Pacific region.

Spotlight Interviews with Co-operators

Marta Lozano Molano, Founding Member of Wazo Cooperative

“Spotlight Interviews with Co-operators” is a series of interviews with co-operators from around the world with whom ILO officials have crossed paths during the course of their work on cooperatives and the wider social and solidarity economy (SSE)....

Support to Local Authorities to implement Recommendation 204

As part of efforts to facilitate the transition from the informal economy to the formal, the ILO convened a two-day meeting with Bulawayo City Council (BCC) to review progress towards promoting the transition from informality to formality for micro,...

Webinar: Formalisation and the MSD approach: business growth, resilience and improved working conditions

ILO Contributes to a UN DESA webinar on MSME formalization through cooperatives

The webinar on “Promoting MSME Formalization through the Cooperative Enterprise Model” took place on 11 March 2021 with the participation of policy makers, cooperatives, and development partners

13 million women in Latin America and the Caribbean saw their jobs disappear due to the COVID-19 pandemic

An unprecedented decline in the labour participation rate and the increase in unemployment make it urgent to apply policies for greater gender equality at work, as a key component of COVID-19 recovery strategies.