The COVID-19 pandemic has touched nearly every aspect of the world of work, from the risk of transmission in the workplace to occupational safety and health (OSH) risks due to the measures used to mitigate the spread of the virus. Shifts to new forms of working arrangements, such as teleworking, also posed potential risks, including psychosocial risks and violence. The World Day for Safety and Health at Work 2021 examines how the current crisis demonstrates the importance of strengthening these OSH systems, including occupational health services, at both the national and undertaking level.
Employment
After the COVID-19 outbreak, demand grew considerably. The government deemed delivery work as essential, next to key activities such as public health and transportation, among others. ILO features the challenges faced by digital platform workers, who have been contributing greatly during this crisis. It sounds nice to take part in essential work, but decent work would be better. Treated by the companies as independent contractors, most of us have no social protection benefits, such as pension coverage, health, or insurance plans.
It has been an immensely challenging year for governments, which have been scrambling to contain the spread of the virus while also managing the economic fallout, supporting workers, and ensuring continuity of schooling for children. At the same time, the climate crisis has not gone away, nor has the soaring gap between rich and poor. In fact, these existing challenges have been magnified by the pandemic. Despite the gloom, there’s some good news; with the right choices, governments can address all of these crises at once, by making the transition to low-carbon, green economies. The International Labour Organization (ILO) estimates that the move to low-carbon, greener economies has the potential to create 60 million jobs by 2030.
The road transport industry has been badly hit by the COVID-19 crisis. Truck drivers are keeping global freight chains moving but have found themselves the victims of COVID-19 restrictions. Urgent action by governments, social partners and road transport supply chain parties is critical, to address the industry’s decent work and liquidity concerns.
Autism is a lifelong neurological condition that manifests during early childhood, irrespective of gender, race, or socio-economic status. Appropriate support, accommodation and acceptance allow those on the Spectrum to enjoy full participation in society. The breakdown of support systems due to COVID-19 exacerbated the obstacles that persons with autism face. We must ensure that these disruptions do not result in rollbacks of the rights of persons with autism, including the right to work. On World Autism Awareness Day we celebrate diversity and promote the rights of persons with autism.
The ‘Barefoot story’ is an engrossing tale: women battling the odds to better themselves in order to help their families and their communities by way of solar energy. The first Barefoot College was established in India in 1972 to train illiterate or semi-illiterate women, and to provide them with the basic skills to be solution-providers in their rural communities. The initiative has now spread to ninety-three countries around the world. The ‘Barefoot’ Solar engineers of Sierra Leone, supported by the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) are part of it.
Fifty countries have shown their commitment to eradicate contemporary forms of slavery by ratifying the ILO Forced Labour Protocol. The ratifications have met an initial target set by the 50 for Freedom campaign, which urges governments to take action on forced labour. Sudan became the fiftieth country to ratify.
Digital labour platforms have increased five-fold worldwide in the last decade according to the ILO’s latest World Employment and Social Outlook 2021 report, presenting opportunities and challenges for workers and businesses and a need for international policy dialogue.
COVID-19 has shown that health, decent work and environmental sustainability are strongly linked. The principles of the circular economy – repair, re-use and recycle are key to achieving sustainable supply chains and can help promote decent work.
The World Day of Social Justice (20 Feb) supports efforts to achieve sustainable development, poverty eradication, the promotion of full employment and decent work, and access to social well-being and justice for all. As the digital economy transforms the world of work, the global pandemic has also exacerbated the growing digital divide within and across developed and developing countries. This year’s observance aims at highlighting what’s needed to overcome the digital divide, provide decent work opportunities, and protect labour and human rights in the modern era of digital technologies.
The latest analysis of the labour market impact of COVID-19 by the ILO, records massive damage to working time and income, with prospects for a recovery in 2021 slow, uneven and uncertain unless early improvements are supported by human-centred recovery policies. New annual estimates in the ILO report confirm the massive impact that labour markets suffered in 2020. The latest figures show that 8.8 per cent of global working hours were lost for the whole of last year, four times than in the 2009 global financial crisis. Women have been more affected than men by the pandemic’s labour market disruptions.
Learning how to cook is about changing your life. This is just what Paola Carosella hopes to achieve with “Kitchen & Voice”. The joint initiative of the Brazilian Public Ministry of Labour and the ILO helps give the most marginalized people – the homeless, abused women, Lesbian, Gay, Bi-sexual, Transgender and Intersex (LGBTI) people – the chance to have a real job. Paola Carosella is a world-renowned Argentine chef who lives in Sao Paulo. She has been working with the ILO since 2017 on “Kitchen and Voice”, a project that promotes labour market access for vulnerable groups in Brazil.
Those working from home, whose number has greatly increased due to the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, need better protection, says the International Labour Organization (ILO) in a new report. Since homeworking occurs in the private sphere it is often “invisible.” In low- and middle-income countries for instance, almost all home-based workers (90 per cent) work informally.
They are usually worse off than those who work outside the home, even in higher-skilled professions. In the first months of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 an estimated one-in-five workers found themselves working from home.
The new ILO Global Wage Report 2020-2021 examines the evolution of real wages around the world, giving a unique picture of wage trends globally and by region.