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THE MAGAZINE OF THE ILO - No. 74, May 2012

Giving Youtha better start


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World o Workmagazine is published three times

a year by the Department o Communicationand Public Inormation o the ILO in Geneva

and distributed ree o charge. Also published

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EDITOR

Hans von Rohland

SPANISH EDITION

In collaboration with ILO-Madrid

PRODUCTION UNIT

Rita Cassaro, Iselin Danbolt,

Martine Jacquinod, Corine Luchini

PHOTO EDITOR

Marcel Crozet

ART DIRECTION

Enzo Fortarezza, MDP, ILO Turin

COVER DESIGN

Nova Development Corporation,

Enzo Fortarezza, MDP, ILO Turin

EDITORIAL BOARD

Thomas Netter (Chair), Charlotte Beauchamp,

Corinne Perthuis, Hans von Rohland

This magazine is not an ocial document o the

International Labour Organization. The opinions

expressed do not necessarily refect the views o

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ISSN 1020-0010

ILO in History

May 7 o this year marks the 80th anniversary o AlbertThomass death in 1932. Ater a devastating world war,the ILOs rst Director (191932) argued that economicand social questions are indissolubly linked and economicreconstruction can only be sound and enduring i it is based

on social justice.

To this end, Albert Thomas created, out o a little group oocials housed in a private residence in London in 1920,an institution with global reach. Under his leadership theILOs world parliament o labour, the International LabourConerence, adopted 33 international Conventions coveringundamental issues such as hours o work, minimum age,health insurance, maternity protection, unemployment, righto association, protection against accidents at work, minimumwages and orced labour.

But Albert Thomas was also well aware o the limits o thewritten word, even those o a Convention. What mattersin todays world is that solutions o this nature imposethemselves on the spirit, that they appear as easible andeective solutions to the crisis..., he said against thebackdrop o the Great Depression.

It was his taste or the concrete which made him venture intothe eld, observe realities and meet the people. In an erawhere fying was not yet a common means o transportation,he travelled extensively to the Americas, Russia, China, Japan,and most o the countries in Europe. He visited actories,descended into mines, and questioned owners and workers.

I I apply mysel to the study o national realities, heexplained, it is to absorb everything which can serve inrealizing the common ideal. In this sense, he was a truedisciple o what today would be called globalization; that is,o universality in the service o social progress.

Furthering social justice


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May 2012, No. 74 | ILO in History | 3

ILOPHOTO

Addressing the International Labour Conerencein 1933, Harold Butler, who succeeded AlbertThomas, reerred to the improvement o socialconditions, the preservation o individual humanrights, and the urtherance o social justice...It was on this oundation that he succeeded increating a tradition which we have inherited...The best memorial which we can raise to his workis to preserve and strengthen that tradition.

Later, ILO leaders urthered this tradition,including the present Director-General, JuanSomavia, when he called or a new era o social

justice on a oundation o decent work againstthe backdrop o another global economic andsocial crisis.

economic andsocial questions

are indissolubly

linked and economic

reconstruction can

only be sound and

enduring if it is based

on social justice

NOTE TO OUR READERS

The media landscape is changing ast and the ILO Department o Communication wants to make ulluse o digital platorms to serve our existing audiences better and reach new ones, including youth.

We hope this will help us increase the impact o the ILOs news and inormation oer.

As a result, this will be the last paper version o the ILO magazine World o Work in its currentormat. The content o uture editions will be available on a revamped ILO public website. And weplan to have special print editions around major ILO events.


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4 | May 2012, No. 74 | Editorial

Youth have been very present in protests acrossthe globe in more than 82 countries and 1,000cities, events which have accelerated since theArab Spring.

Many are pessimistic, eeling powerless tochange their situation. They ask: What am Igoing to do? Is there no way towards a better

uture?

From the perspective o the world o work,these are legitimate questions driven byunderstandable ears: globally, our out oevery ten unemployed persons is a youngwoman or man.

In some countries one o every ouryoung persons is unemployed. And youthunemployment is three times higher than adultunemployment - in some regions nearly ve

times. In certain instances the situation oyoung women is even more acute.

And unemployment is only one dimension othe problem. Too many young people end upin situations o inormality and poor workingconditions. Some, discouraged, ill equipped,without belie in themselves and in the presentsystems end up detaching themselves romthe labour market with adverse consequencesor their personal development, their amiliesand societies.

It is a disturbing pattern that brings the risko a lost generation today and the loss oaith in the capacity o systems to deliverimprovements in the lives o people over time.

With the youth employment crisis attainingunprecedented dimensions, aggravated bythe global nancial and economic crisesand the prospects o slow, uncertain anduneven recovery, there is a widespreadacknowledgement that a tipping point hasbeen reached.

We cannot allow young women and men togive up or to nd that the only avenues opento them lead to lives o working poverty andinsecurity. The energy, creativity and dynamismo youth are needed in shaping a better utureor all and there are many examples o howsuch potential can be unleashed with the rightopportunity.

Yet, youth unemployment is also part o abroader world o work crisis.

Current growth models have progressivelyshown their limitations in closing the jobsdecit and responding adequately to peoplesaspirations or decent work. The meaning owork labour is not a commodity hasbeen widely devalued while growing inequality,shrinking opportunity and decreasing mobilitynarrow the options or securing sustainablegrowth with decent jobs.

The employment and decent work challengemust eectively begin with new growthstrategies that can deliver better results or

people: policies to promote employment anddecent work or young people must also beanchored in job-rich and inclusive growth andrecovery strategies.

By Juan Somavia, Director-General o the ILO

Editorial

The youth employment crisis:

M.Crozet/ILO


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May 2012, No. 74 | Editorial | 5

The youth challengeThe challenge ahead is very much a youthchallenge: the world will need to create 600million jobs over the next ten years in order toabsorb the 400 million new entrants annuallyinto the labour market, in addition to the 200million already unemployed in 2012 owhich 75 million are youth.

This demands a real commitment to investingin young people, making every eort to ring-ence youth and programmes that supporttheir education, employment and school towork transitions. Disadvantaged youth alsoneed to have a air chance and a secondchance. Supporting pathways out o the youthemployment crisis and towards decent workthat are context-specic and that have proventheir ecacy should take center stage.

Such an approach would combine macro- andmicroeconomic interventions, address labourdemand and supply, the quantity as well as thequality o employment.

It would include active labour market policiestogether with social protection measurestargeting youth, more and better trainingaddressing skills mismatches and, encouragingyouth entrepreneurship and enterprisedevelopment, eective implementation ointernational labour standards and the deenceo labour rights. Not least, policies that

work or youth must also be inormed by theperspectives o youth requiring mechanismsor the participation o young people andengagement with them.

This agenda or action provides a policyocus at national level as well as a compassor regional and international initiatives. It isalso a solid oundation or constructing multi-layered partnerships.

Time for actionIn June 2012, the International LabourConerence discussion on youth employmentwill take up these issues. The backgroundReport The youth employment crisis: Time

or action1 highlights the lessons learntrom many country experiences since the lastsuch Conerence discussion in 2005 and theresulting Resolution.2 It also gives a rangeo options that can be applied in dierentcontexts and or dierent groups o youth.

A series o 45 national youth dialoguestaking place in March and April 2012, willbe ollowed by a Youth Employment Forumin Geneva (23 to 25 May) organized to heardirectly rom young people their hopes, their

ideas and proposals or the uture world owork.

The demand or decent work or all, or dignity,and or social justice has been echoing acrossregions. It is time to build economies andsocieties where young people can secure astake in the present and in the uture.

Pathways to a better future

1 http://www.ilo.org/ilc/ILCSessions/101stSession/reports/reports-submitted/WCMS_175421/lang--en/index.htm

2 Resolution concerning youth employment, adopted bythe 93rd session o the International Labour Conerence(Geneva, June 2005): http://www.ilo.org/public/english/standards/relm/ilc/ilc93/pd/resolutions.pd

M.Crozet/ILO


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Cover Story

g

At the latest World Economic Forum in Davos,Switzerland, the ILO Director-General reerredto pro-employment strategies or youth thatwould eventually sustain consumption, boostdemand, promote growth and create morejobs. The ollowing articles are intendedto give a ew examples o successul youthemployment initiatives around the globe.

8

Created in 1919, the International Labour Organization (ILO) brings together governments, employers and workers o its 183 memberStates in common action to improve social protection and conditions o lie and work throughout the world. The International Labour Oce,in Geneva, is the permanent Secretariat o the Organization.

ContentsMay 2012, No. 74

M.Crozet/ILO

Arab youth aspiring to social justice and decent work

A nascent youth employment movement in Kenya

Giving young people the right skills or todays jobs

Listen to young people in Latin America

Giving Indonesias new generation the skills and sel-condence to nd decent work

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11

13

15

17

M.Crozet/ILO


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May 2012, No. 74 | Contents | 7

News

Global Employment Trends 2012:World aces a 600-million jobschallenge

Somavia puts the accent onyouth employment

15th Asia and the PacicRegional Meeting

28

31

33

35

General Articles

Women: An unmined resource

Decent work and education: A winwincombination

The bitter tobacco plant gives way to thereshness o oregano

Kenyan cooperative sells microinsuranceover the phone

38

42M.Croze

t/ILO

Around the Continents

44

Media Shelf

46

ILOPHOTO

Photo Report

Kenya: Learning about changesin the lives o child labourers

20

41

M.Crozet/ILO

M.Crozet/ILO


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8 | May 2012, No. 74 | Cover Story

Cover Story

the higher andlower education and

income levels are

equally affected by

unemployment

Giving youth

H.

Homay

ounpour/ILO

Arab youth aspiring tosocial justice and decent work


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May 2012, No. 74 | Cover Story | 9

a better startIn 2011, youth unemployment rates

in the Arab region have reached a

worrying average o more than 27.3 per

cent. For young women, the average

unemployment rate is even worse 41.1

per cent besides the act that their

labour market participation is alreadymuch lower than anywhere else in

the world. Even i young people have

jobs, working conditions are oten very

poor, says Ms Dorothea Schmidt, ILO

Employment Specialist in North Arica.

According to the ILO expert, wages in theArab region are low, there is little socialprotection, working arrangements are poorand career prospects are limited. So it is no

wonder that many young people are angry,Ms Schmidt concludes.

For young people in the region it happenstoo oten that reality does not meet theiraspirations. The higher and lower educationand income levels are equally aected byunemployment. Whats more, social securitycoverage, including unemployment andpension schemes, usually exist only or civilservants. I you are unemployed, you will slipinto poverty very quickly, Ms Schmidt says.

The eeling o rustration among youth isexacerbated by the act that the parents haveinvested a lot o money in the education otheir children hoping to ensure a better utureor them.

According to Ms Schmidt, the labour marketproblems in the region are very similar,although the countries dier in manyrespects. For example, in Tunisia, youthhave received a much better education thanin Egypt. Similarly, Tunisia has made more

progress in combatting discrimination againstwomen in the labour market than othercountries in the region.


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But the overall situation in Tunisia is stillvery problematic. The revolution may havetoppled the regime, but it hasnt reed Tunisiarom unemployment, especially among theyoung and educated. One out o three youngpeople are unemployed here; at around30 per cent, its a shockingly high rate or acountry with such a well-educated workorce,explains Ms Schmidt.

Job market cannot absorb youthTunisia adds 20,000 new entrants each yearto a job market that cannot absorb them.Paradoxically, its easier to nd work here i youdont have a university degree since the majorityo jobs are created in the inormal economy andin low-skilled sectors like agriculture or trade.But these jobs pay low wages and workingconditions can be dangerous.

The highly educated and highly skilled haveequally high expectations when they graduate

rom university they want a decent job.As Lassaad Labidi, Director o the TunisianNational Institute or Work and Social Studiesputs it, The big challenge is to nd workater nishing school. Our students takethe courses but always in the back o theirminds theres the niggling question: Whatopportunities will there be aterwards?

Also in Egypt, most o the new jobs arecreated in the inormal economy.

Job creation is a top priority or the newgovernments in the two countries, but thiswill not happen overnight. However, in themedium term a lot could already be achieved,

i training o young people ocused moreon the needs o employers and enterprises.In turn, employers should improve workingconditions or and their attitude towards

young people, says Ms Schmidt.

Another important point made by the ILOexpert is that labour market policies shouldensure that supply and demand meet. In thisregard public as well as private employmentservices have to become much strongerto ull their mandate o matching peoplelooking or employment with available jobs.

Finally, young entrepreneurs must beencouraged to set up their own businesses.

Small and medium-sized enterprises createmost o the jobs in todays world, she says,adding that support or the private sector,especially or the development o micro- andsmall enterprises that have high potential tocreate jobs or youth, is essential.

ILO programmes to promote youthemployment are expanding in many countrieso the Middle East and North Arica (MENA)region. These programmes aim to improvethe school-to-work transition, including

through the ormulation and implementationo comprehensive packages o active labourmarket policies that target disadvantagedyouth. The ILO is also supporting institutionalreorms with a view o improving thegovernance o the labour market.

The ILO youth employment programmesin North Arica are currently being undedby Canada, Italy, Spain, the Unites Statesand the European Union. Because o themagnitude o the youth employment challengein the region, we are currently looking to

expand our programmes by building broad-based partnerships, concludes Gianni Rosas,Coordinator o the ILO Youth EmploymentProgramme.

Projects with Australia, Denmark, Finland,Norway and Switzerland are about to benalized. Their integrated approach willensure that the employment challenge istackled rom all sides: the supply side throughskills training, the demand side throughcreating jobs, and the matching process

between jobseekers and employers. At thesame time, projects will strengthen socialdialogue and social protection, and promoteinternational labour standards.

ILO/APEX


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A nascent youth employment

movement in KenyaIn sub-Saharan Arica millions o young

workers are engaged in survival activities,

mostly in the inormal economy.

Journalist Anne Holmes reports rom

Aricas second largest slum in Kenya,

where cooperatives and green jobs

help address the youth employment

challenge. With ILO support, the

development o cooperatives is a priority

o the national action plan or youth

employment in Kenya.

In Kenya, cooperatives are helping youth litthemselves out o poverty. Youth cooperativeshave created jobs through projects incommunity gardens, processing waste or bio-uel or sanitation.

Victor Matioli, 34, is one o the beneciaries o

these projects. In the community greenhouse,he has already a project in place that iscreating jobs or youth.

He explains how the Youth Reorm GreenhouseOrganic Farm came into being: Since thepost-election violence is the day that westarted arming. We came with the idea ojoining the youth together and rehabilitatingthem to do good things.

During post-election violence three years ago,young people were tearing up the railroad

tracks that run through Kibera, urious overthe lack o jobs and sky-high unemployment.Thousands o idle young women and mentook to the streets to disrupt and burn thebusinesses and houses o perceived memberso the economically advantaged.

Today, residents have rebuilt theircommunities, and the hustle and bustle withinthe inormal settlement has shited romrustrated violence to productive work. Out onKiberas main artery, a car wash business is

teeming with energy. Gabriel Owino managesthe cooperative enterprise he started with agroup o riends 10 years ago and also overseesa mechanics shop next to the spring.

These people have their own qualications orwork. Some come and go and get good jobs,he says. There are people who are going toschool. There are people who have certicateshere, and they dont have jobs so we keepourselves busy, out o (the) streets.

Flying toilets

One o the main challenges in these settlementsis the lack o proper sanitation services.Flying toilets, polyurethane bags used ordeecation and thrown by the wayside, pollutethe landscape, and the lack o proper sewagesystems lead to public latrines becomingblocked, oten overfowing when the rains come.

The major problem in Kibera is toilets andshowers, says Mr Matioli. People donthave them. This gap in public services hasstimulated one o the more stable employment

opportunities or Kibera residents who decidedto take matters into their own hands.

The Umande Trust, an organization sponsoredby the ILOs Cooperative Facility or Aricathrough its Challenge Fund, is one o the mostinnovative groups involved. They employ largelyyouth or womens groups to build and operatewhat they call bio centres, public latrinesthat use bio-base rom processed human wasteto heat water or the public showers. The gas isalso sold to local residents or cooking.

We are looking now at the human waste asan investment that can produce bio-gas, andthis is a clean orm o energy. We are able toharness that and ensure that we are providinga dignied, clean orm o sanitation servicesto the community, says Paul Muchire,Communications Manager at Umande Trust.Remember this is methane, and methane ismore harmul than carbon, thereore, when youburn that methane you reduce the degree oharm it will cause to the environment.

Umande has over 50 similar centresthroughout Kenya that are run by independentcommunity groups. Most o them are locatedwithin Nairobis inormal settlements.


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In Mali 73 per cent o the economically active

population work in the inormal economy. A third o

these workers are young people who can only fnd

jobs in rural areas. Among young people in urban

areas, youth unemployment is remarkably high. In

the capital Bamako it reaches 32 per cent.

Malis Agency or the Promotion o YouthEmployment is implementing a national programmeto integrate youth in the labour market throughlabour-intensive investments. The programme isnanced by a National Fund or Youth Employmentwhich is nanced by a 2 per cent contribution rompayroll tax.

The ILO-supported project has created more than70,517 workdays since 2006. It contributeddirectly to the integration o many young workersinto the rural labour market. Jobs or youth

range rom selling agricultural products to themaintenance o arm equipment and road paving.

Training on the use o local materials andtechniques is part o the project that providesvocational training to youth across the country.Employment-intensive techniques in constructionhave been progressively extended to otherinvestment programmes such as the AgriculturalSector Support Program, the National RoadDirectorate in Bamako and the private sector.

Working in partnership with the Agency or theDevelopment o Employment-Intensive Approaches

and other stakeholders, the ILO enabled localcommunities and administrations to include theseapproaches in national and local budgets. Theproject has been unded by the Government o Maliand the Grand Duchy o Luxembourg.

EMPLOYMENT-INTENSIVE INVESTMENT PROGRAMMES:

JOBS FOR YOUTH IN MALI

M.Crozet/ILO

A new look at the existing world

Our starting point is that Kibera has assets people go to school, there is radio, they havecybercaes, there is Internet, says Managing

Trustee Josiah Omotto, who ounded theorganization with a group o riends in 2004.Weve tried to move away rom the Kiberao poverty, because the moment you look atpeople rom a poverty perspective, you arebasically perpetuating helplessness.

Mr Omotto explains that over the last ten years,employment has been based on social capital.You know somebody, you get a job, he adds.In the high-income areas, unemployment isvery low because they know people in the private

sector, they know people in the public sector.

However, Kibera residents and those o theother inormal settlements in Nairobi arelargely excluded rom that economic sector.They survive by going rom one small job to

the next, selling ood at stalls in the streetsor hawking recycled goods. Steady incomeremains an exception.

Umande Trust basically means nascent.Looking at the world with a new beginning.Not recycling the ideas o yesterday, saysMr Omotto, We really are about justice.

Maria-Elena Chavez, Chie o the ILOCooperative Branch, adds: SACCO membersare very committed and coops have made avery visible contribution to their well-being.Walking through Kibera, members o theSACCO proudly showed us their bio-centre,their accounts and the savings they had,

telling us how their children could go toschool because they were able to access smallloans rom the SACCO to buy school uniorms.This is a very impressive example o howcoops and youth can make a huge dierencein peoples lives.

M.Crozet/ILO


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Giving young people the right skillsfor todays jobsAt a time when youth unemployment

has reached alarming levels,

governments are urgently seeking ways

to tackle the crisis and deuse the

potential time bomb o an increasingly

disheartened and angry generation.

Journalist Patrick Moser reports.

Providing young men and women with theskills they need to enter the marketplaceis a crucial element in addressing youthunemployment, which aects an estimated74.8 million youth worldwide.

Vocational education and training (VET) canplay a central role in preparing young peopleor work, but experts say that in many casessuch programmes ail to respond to labourmarket needs.

Yet, it is widely agreed that building solidbridges between the worlds o learning andwork is key to ensuring that young people

learn skills required by the labour markets.Countries that have had some success inraising employment among young peopleclosely link vocational training with labourmarket needs.

Michael Axmann, an expert in skillsdevelopment systems at the ILO, cites the

example o Germanys latest reorm o itslong standing dual system, which combinesapprenticeship training by companies withschool-based theoretical training.

An acute skills shortage in Germanys IT sectorin the late 1990s led to the developmento new apprenticeships designed to meetthe sectors specic needs, with strongemphasis on helping young people plan andcarry out their work independently. The ITapprenticeships are now highly popular and

have led to a smoother recruitment processand spearheaded a reorm process aimed atmaking the dual system more fexible andmore relevant.

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Training alone nevercreates jobs

The ILO expert cautions, however, that

training alone never creates jobs.

According to Axmann, enterprise-basedtraining helps young people to get a ootholdin the world o work. Because o the lack o anemployment record, such training helps youngpeople and employers to get to know each other.

Workplaces provide a strong learningenvironment, developing hard skills on modernequipment, and sot skills through real worldexperience o teamwork, communication and

negotiation; workplace training acilitatesrecruitment by allowing employers and potentialemployees to get to know each other, whiletrainees contribute to the output o the trainingrm, the Organisation or Economic Co-operationand Development (OECD) says in a recent report.

The OECD report insists on the act, thatworkplace learning opportunities are alsoa direct expression o employer needs, asemployers will be keenest to oer those

opportunities in areas o skills shortage.

Adapting skills to the jobs

of the future

In all countries the implications or skillsdevelopment are momentous. Many o thejobs that will be generated over the next twodecades do not exist today; yet most o theworkorce o those years is already in educationand training.

Skills development is expected to play amajor role as economies move toward cleanerenergy use, creating new, green jobs. Severalcountries are already reporting shortageso skills in the renewable energy and other

YOUTH EMPLOYMENT IN SERBIA

In Serbia, unemployment rates among youth are three

times those o adults (37.4 per cent and 12.3 per cent,

respectively, in 2010). Low-educated young women

and men, young Roma, internally displaced youth

and reugees ace even more severe challenges, such

as underemployment, precarious jobs, poor working

conditions and work in the inormal economy.

The countrys Youth Employment Policy andAction Plan (20092011) emphasizesemployment-intensive growth, employability,labour market inclusion through targeted measures,and governance o the youth labour market.Some US$3.9 million, rom both governmentand donor resources, channelled into the existing

Youth Employment Fund, have supported theimplementation o a wide range o integratedyouth employment measures.

Active labour market programmes have targetedmore than 3,500 disadvantaged youth. Most othese young people have low levels o education(85 per cent), are long-term unemployed (60 percent) and have no work experience (52 per cent).

Government monitoring data show that, amongyoung beneciaries who are working, as many as85 per cent have entered ull-time employment.More than hal o them work in the sameenterprise rom which they received training

(57 per cent), and use the skills acquired through

on-the-job training (62 per cent). Whats more,the wages o programme participants are between10 and 20 per cent higher than the statutoryminimum wage.

The ILO has worked with the Ministries o Economyand Regional Development, Labour and SocialPolicy and the social partners on the developmentand implementation o the Youth Employment Policyand Action Plan; the establishment o the YouthEmployment Fund; the development o evidence-based youth-specic employment policy objectivesand targets; the integration o labour market,migration and social services; and the provision ocapacity building or the labour market.

YEM


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green sectors. There is an urgent needor training in the ull complement o skillsrequired across a broad range o jobs so thateconomies can both continue greening and

realize the potential growth in employment theprocess oers, the ILO says in a orthcomingreport on skills and green jobs.

In many cases, curriculum reorm is neededto make skills programmes relevant to todaysworld o work. This oten may involve athorough rethinking o the way skills arebeing imparted. Rather than being taught to

memorize vast amounts o technical details,students need to learn to think in unctionalcontexts and take analytical approaches toproblems, explains Axmann.

With vocational education and training, ortoo long we made our students develop abrain that acts like a computer with a smallprocessor and a huge memory, but what theyactually need to succeed in todays world owork is a brain with a much bigger processorunit while the memory capabilities could bemuch smaller, the ILO expert concludes.

Listen to young peoplein Latin America

Young people in LatinAmerica who nd ajob will very oten haveto accept one in theinormal economy where 60 out o every100 young workerswork in the region. Thelack o jobs availableor young people, aswell as the poor quality

o these jobs, causerustration and anger.Nearly 20 million youngpeople in Latin Americaare neither in educationnor in employment ortraining (NEETS).

Let us listen to whatthey have to say. Youthunemployment andunderemployment

prevent us rom usingthe potential o the most highly trained andeducated generation we have ever seen. Thereare also major political repercussions, because

young people have takento the streets, askingdemocracies or answers.They want opportunities.Let us listen to whatthey have to say and actaccordingly, Ms Tinocosaid at the Forum.

Call for job-led

growth

Youth employmentproblems are structuraland require specicpolicies to be addressed,Forum participantsagreed. The act thatyouth unemployment,underemployment andinormality remain higheven in times when the

region has improved itsrecord or other labour market indicators showsthat growth is needed but not sucient unless itis ocused on job creation.

Social and economic progress is

unsustainable unless the policy

challenge o creating better

opportunities or young people is

addressed, ILO Regional Director

or Latin America and the Caribbean,

Elizabeth Tinoco, told participants

at an International Forum on

Employment, Youth and Democratic

Governance in Lima, Peru, last

December. I society does not create

jobs or them, young people tend

to lose confdence in democratic

institutions.

M.Crozet/ILO


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M.Crozet/ILO

Despite a signifcant economic expansion inthe last decade, two out o three unemployed

persons in Peru were aged between 15 and 29

years in 2010. Four out o fve young workers

were in precarious jobs and more than hal (56

per cent) o the 8 million youth in Peru would

consider emigration i they had the chance.

To respond to these challenges, Peru haslaunched a National Youth EmploymentPolicy and a Youth Employment Action Plan(20092012) to tackle youth employment andunderemployment. Activities under the Planpromote employment creation, entrepreneurshipand employability. The implementation isoverseen by a national tripartite committeeincluding young representatives o employersand workers organizations.

Out o the 370,000 targeted, more than260,000 disadvantaged youth have so arbeneted rom the measures o the Plan.Building on a national survey showing thatmore than 75 per cent o microenterprisesrun by youth did not last longer than one year,the Government has introduced a series oinstitutional reorms.

They include the reduction o red tape and

costs relating to job applications throughthe introduction by the Public EmploymentService (PES); the introduction o a one-stop-

shop ree o charge single certicate thatcontains all pieces o inormation on young jobapplicants (Certi Joven); the modernization ocareer guidance services; the establishmento a training programme (Joven Emprendedor)targeting young entrepreneurs, alongside aninormation system that simplies marketassessments; and the establishment o aninormation and orientation service or youngmigrants living abroad and young Peruviansplanning to migrate (Inomigra). Some o theabove measures have been integrated into thenewly developed National Employment Policy,which mainstreams youth employment.

The ILO worked closely with the LabourMinistry and the Inter-ministerial Committeeor Employment on the development andimplementation o the Youth EmploymentAction Plan and the National EmploymentPolicy. The activities were supported by theYouth Employment and Migration Programmewhich is unded by the US$3 million SpanishMillennium Development Goals AchievementFund. They were implemented by the Ministryo Labour, the Ministry o Women and SocialDevelopment, the National Youth Secretariatand the National Institute o Statistics.

Technical assistance was provided by theUnited Nations country team, including theILO, UNFPA, UNDP and IOM.

EMPLOYMENT AND MIGRATION SERVICESFOR YOUNG PEOPLE IN PERU

In many Latin American countries the issueo youth employment is already on the policyagenda. At the Forum, representatives ogovernments, employers organizations and

if society does not

create jobs for them,

young people tendto lose confidence in

democratic institutions

trade unions agreed on the importance onot leaving young workers alone and thatspecic policies should aim at improving theiropportunities to get decent jobs when theyapproach the labour market.

The ILO recently started to develop

regional platorms or cooperation on youthemployment. These can help countriesshare knowledge, review progress onimplementation o policies and programmesand pull together expertise, including throughpeer reviews and mutual learning.


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M.Crozet/ILO

Giving Indonesias new

generationthe skills andself-condence to nd decent work

Indonesias new generation o youngpeople are creative, connected,

concerned and keen to succeed. But

today, ar too many cant fnd decent

jobs. More than 6 out o 10 young

workers are trapped in lowskill, low

productivity occupations in the inormal

economy. But change is possible, as

this report by journalist Eric May rom

Indonesia shows, where creating jobs

or youth has become a top priority.

Wardah is a university student enrolledin a business skills training course calledStart Your Business, part o the ILO EASTproject in South Sulawesi, an area with oneo the highest youth unemployment rates inIndonesia.

Ater the training, Wardah invested moneyshe had saved to start up her own cell phoneservice business at a local market. She madeback her investment ater two months, and

business is so good Wardah is planning a moveto a bigger shop.

Wardah is one o tens o thousands oyouth that beneted rom the activities othe ILO and its partners in the IndonesianGovernment as well as the countrysemployers associations and trade unions.Along with the support o internationaldonors, they have all made a signicantcontribution to improving Indonesias youthemployment situation.

Ten years ago the ILO helped ocus attentionon Indonesias youth employment problemand supported the policy-makers to turn

priorities into action. In 2002, Indonesiabecame one o the rst countries torespond to the United Nations MillenniumDevelopment Goals on youth employment,becoming a lead country in the UNs YouthEmployment Network.

The Indonesian Government together withemployers organizations and trade unions,along with the support o the ILO and theDutch Government, have made a signicantcontribution to improving Indonesias youth

employment situation.

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, speaking at the100th International Labour Conerence (ILC) in Geneva

young people can

make an important

contribution to global

prosperity. we mustinvest more in sectors

that generate jobs for

youth


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Making youth employmenta national priority

In 2004, the Indonesia Youth EmploymentAction Plan was developed to deal with theyouth employment challenge. Today, youthemployment is a priority o the NationalDevelopment Plan that is being implementedby a designated group o young proessionalsat the Ministry o Planning who are committedto ostering coordination and joint actionamong various partners.

At the national level, the Job Opportunitiesor Youth programme strengthened the

capacity o the Government to ormulateand implement policies and programmesor youth employment. For instance,employment oces were established to giveyoung jobseekers practical inormation oncareers and job-search skills. Job airs wereorganized to help employers meet with youngjobseekers.

In the rural provinces o East Java, where thereare many more jobseekers than available jobs,and very ew entrepreneurs, the ILO and its

partners decided that training young peoplein sel-employment skills could be a viableapproach.

18

A.

Mirza/ILO


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The idea was endorsed by the provincialGovernor and every school district wasinstructed to implement it. More than 2,000teachers and acilitators were trained in howto teach business start-up and entrepreneurialskills in vocational schools and trainingproviders. Teachers not only became betterentrepreneurship teachers, but better teachersin general thanks to their newly acquired skills.

The ILO Education and Skills Training orYouth Employment Programme (EAST) ocused

on improving the school-to-work transitionin six provinces by targeting specic groupso disadvantaged youth and providing them

with a package o education and employmentservices, spanning second chanceprogrammes or out-o-school youth to careerguidance, skills and entrepreneurial trainingand other services.

For instance, more than 4,000 out-o-schoolchildren at risk o child labour were enrolledin school or inormal education; more than76,000 students beneted rom regularcounselling sessions. About 13,000 youngpeople, both in and out o school, were trainedin entrepreneurship and vocational skills, usingStart and Improve Your Business and KnowAbout Business. More than 40 per cent othem started micro-businesses within sixmonths rom the completion o the courses.

Pioneering youth

employment initiatives

Several youth employment initiatives weredeveloped and piloted in Indonesia. Forinstance, the ILO led the development oan integrated approach that includes theidentication o skills in demand ollowedby the implementation o competency-basedtraining programmes that include skills

assessment and certication as well as supportto youth in their job search and placement.

Following the success o the pilot initiative,this approach has been adopted by theMinistry o Education and applied at thenational level. Similarly, the training moduleon rights at work or young people was revisedby Indonesian trade unions to respond to therealities o the country. The association oyoung entrepreneurs looked into the businessclimate to support young people who werewilling to set up their own business.

The broad-based partnerships or youthemployment established in Indonesia havedemonstrated that joint action in tacklingthe youth employment challenge can make agreater impact. These include collaborationamong schools and training providers,government ministries, the social partnersand youth organizations at both national andlocal levels. Similarly, cooperation amongvarious international organizations canimprove policy coherence and coordination on

youth employment in a country, concludesGianni Rosas, Coordinator o the ILO YouthEmployment Programme (YEP).


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20 | May 2012, No. 74 | Photo Report

Learning about changes inThe ILOs International Programme on

the Elimination o Child Labour (IPEC)

was created in 1992 with the overall

goal o the progressive elimination o

child labour. With operations in more

than 80 countries, IPEC is the largest

programme o its kind globally and the

biggest single operational programme

o the ILO.

One way o identiying the longer-termchanges in the lives o children as a resulto a child labour project are tracer studies.A tracer study is a retrospective analysis which

takes a sample o ormer beneciaries o achild labour project to capture the changes intheir lives, and that o their amilies, ollowingthe intervention. Tracer studies take placeone to eight years ater the end o a project.They help to understand what works, andunder what circumstances, in the ght againstchild labour. These studies thus producevaluable inormation or any uture programmeplanning, policy advice and decision-makingin this area.

Between 2009 and 2011, IPEC carried

out six tracer studies1 o nalized ILO-IPECprojects through the Impact AssessmentProject unded by the US Department oLabor. The assessments covered childrenormerly associated with armed orces andarmed groups in the Democratic Republic o

Congo and Burundi, and ormer child labourersin agriculture and street work (Morocco),agriculture and shing (El Salvador), sugarcane

plantations and mining (Philippines),commercial sexual exploitation and domesticlabour (Paraguay), and agriculture (Kenya).

The tracer study in KenyaThe tracer study in Kenya interviewed 252ormer beneciaries o the Time Bound Project(TBP) o Support to the National Plan o Actionon the Elimination o the Worst Forms oChild Labour. Launched in 2005, this ILO-IPEC project included model interventions to

strengthen primary education and vocationaltraining, public awareness-raising campaigns,economic empowerment, and capacity buildingor the Government and communities. Withtechnical support rom IPEC Geneva, a localconsulting agency with experience in eldworkand quantitative studies was responsible orconducting the tracer study and drating thenal report.

The ILO photographer, Marcel Crozet,2 travelledwith the tracer study team in the rural areaswhere the TBP Project had been implemented

and in such a way as not to iner with thestudy. The teams eldwork involved tracingormer beneciaries and interviewing themwith a previously developed questionnaire. Inmost cases these ormer beneciaries werechild labourers in agriculture.

1 Child Labour Impact Assessment Toolkit: Tracer StudyManual. International Programme on the Elimination o

Child Labour (IPEC). ILO, Geneva, 2011.

2 The photographer obtained the explicit agreemento children and youth to be photographed. His photo

report provides insights into the tracer study process,portraying some selected stories o ormer projectbeneciaries. It is important to note, however, that thephotographs are not necessarily representative o thendings and that, except when explicitly stated, not allphotographs portray ormer beneciaries.

Kenya


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May 2012, No. 74 | Photo Report | 21

the lives ofchild labourersMany children in Busia are orphansor live with disabilities. With manylorry drivers stopping or the night

in Busia, some girls sell their bodiesjust to eed themselves, sometimesor just 20 Kenyan shillings (aboutUS$0.22), which will buy them hala bottle o soda. According to socialworkers, more than 500 sex workershave been identied in this part oBusia. Some o the girls are under18, and all o them are at risk obeing inected with HIV.

Photo Report

Busia is one o the border towns betweenKenya and Uganda. Heavy lorries are crossingthe dusty streets 24 hours a day. The so-called

no mans land between the two countries isactually lled with people including manychildren working both in the ormal andinormal economy. The Busia district was oneo the areas covered by the ILOs tracer study.

All photos: M. Crozet/ILO


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Just outside Busia, childlabour can be ound in theelds as many children helpin agriculture. However, asmost o them go to school onweekdays, they work mainly

on weekends.

22


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May 2012, No. 74 | Photo Report | 23

The situation o so calledstreet children (here atthe Kisumu lorry park) isworrisome. Dozens o themspend most o the day sningglue. Some o them suerrom mental illness, urtherincreasing the level o violenceamong them.

23


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24 | May 2012, No. 74 | Photo Report24

Many children are involved indomestic work, whether or notthey go to school, as can beseen urther south on the shoreo Lake Victoria.


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The objective o the IPECtracer study in Kenya was toassess changes brought about

in the lives o children whowere supported by an ILO-IPEC project that nished in2009, and assess i the projectinfuenced these changes. Inthe Manyatta district o Kisumu,tracer study eld researcherChristine Abongo (right) sitsdown with 22-year-old JacklineAdhiambo, to go through thetracer study questionnaire.

19-year-old Carolin Awuor (right) is the mother o a baby girl and also aormer beneciary o the ILO-IPEC project. The project helped changeher lie by providing her with the necessary training to become a tailor.She can be seen here with Christine Abongo.

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22-year-old Elizabeth Akinyi,here at the Kisumu market,was also supported by the ILO-IPEC project making it possible

or her to start selling sodasand home-made cakes at herkiosk. Several years ater beingsupported, the impact o theintervention is clearly lastingmaking it possible or Elizabethto earn her living.

26


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The ILO-IPEC projectprovided Syrone (right) with ascholarship and he completedsecondary school. He was thenadmitted to Jomo KenyattaUniversity to pursue a Bacheloro Landscape Architecturedegree.

I experienced a lot ohardship, Kelvin Mwangi(right) recalls, here with

Joakim Ndorongo (let).The arm owners usedchildren as a cheap source olabour.

Both Joakim and Kelvinbeneted rom scholarshipscovering their school ees.Since they were excellentstudents, they attendedKanunga High School. Laterthey were both admitted tothe Jomo Kenyatta University.Kelvin pursues a Bachelor oScience degree in AnalyticalChemistry and Joakim isa mechanical engineeringstudent. They posed or thisphotograph in the very samecoee plantations where theyused to work as children.

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28 | May 2012, No. 74 | General Articles

Women: An unmined resource

Until a ew decades ago, most

countries banned women rom workingin mines. But over time, women

have made their way into this male-

dominated territory, proving they have

what it takes to succeed. Patrick

Moser, a Geneva-based journalist,

reports.

When Claudia Haney goes hal a kilometreunderground, she commands respect rom the300 men at K + S Kalis Neuho-Ellers mine in

the German state o Hesse.

The 33-year-old is the rst woman to head amine in Germany.

Mining has long been the exclusive territory o

men, with hostility to women refected in themyth that a womans presence would cause thepit to collapse.

But over the past decades, women have madetheir way into the mines. While they remaina minority in the still male-dominated sector,their numbers are growing. That is good news,not just or the women, but also or the miningindustry, which aces major skills shortages.

In Australia, mining heiress Gina Rinehart

has turned her amily company rom a smallprospecting outt to a global mining group,in the process becoming the countrys richestwoman.

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General Articles


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May 2012, No. 74 | General Articles | 29

In 2007, Cynthia Carroll was the rst womanto be named chie executive o London-basedmining giant Anglo American.

I never thought o mining as somethinga woman shouldnt do, says CorneliaHoltzhausen, the general manager oAnglo Americans Kumba iron ore mine inThabazimbi, South Arica. I grew up in amining environment my riends ather was ametallurgist at a gold mine and Ive always

ound it very stimulating, she says.

In Australias mining state o Queensland,authorities launched last year the Womenin Hard Hats initiative to encourage girlsto consider non-traditional careers such asmining.

Recruiting women is a winwin, as theyrepresent the largest untapped talent poolavailable to employers needing to address theirskills shortages, says Queensland Minister or

Women, Karen Struthers. These industriesneed women. It is no longer a choice. Miningcareers or women need to be a reality not anovelty.

Increasing womens representation in non-traditional industries will help tackle theskills shortage and allow women and girls toget a slice o Queenslands resources boom,Struthers says.

In Canadas British Columbia (BC), one in 20jobs is in the mineral exploration and mining

industry, but women make up only 16 percent o that workorce, including a mere veper cent in jobs considered non-traditionalor women, such as labourers and heavyequipment operators.

With BCs mineral exploration and miningindustry orecasting it will need almost 6,000additional workers by 2016, a task orceinvestigating the issue said last year thatreaching out to women is crucial or the sector.

It is clear that these challenges are notrestricted to BC, the team said in its reportWomen: An unmined resource. For example,private-sector companies operating in

Australia and South Arica, along with localgovernments are purposeully ocusingeorts and resources to make the industrymore appealing to women and other minority

groups.

Yet the report laments that the industry and itsculture remain male-dominated, with womenreporting they were shut out o social activities.The report also cites a lack o emales in seniorroles as perpetuating the belie that they arenot equal to men.

Until a ew decades ago, women in manycountries were banned rom working belowground.

Sandra Collins was one o the rst women tostudy mining engineering in Queensland andthe second in Australia to actually work inthe industry. She is now operations managerat a major coalmine in Queensland. But inthe 1980s she had to ght legislation thatprevented women rom working in undergroundmines to begin her trailblazing career.

This was a hangover rom the days (in the1800s) when the legislation was ormed toget women and children out o the mines,

she told the Australian TV station ABC. Ithadnt been changed and it was still onthe books.

The ban on women workingunderground dates back to the mid-19th century. A public outcry overhorrendous conditions in Britishmines, described in a report bya Royal Commission, resultedin the Mines Act 1842 whichprohibited women as well as

children under ten rom workingin mines. This practice alsoound refection in the ILOsUnderground Work (Women)

ILOPHOTO

i never thought of

mining as something a

woman shouldnt do


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Convention (No. 45), which was adopted in1935, and prohibited underground work orwomen.

However, in the years ollowing the adoptiono the Saety and Health in Mines Convention,1995 (No. 176) which calls on memberStates to develop and implement a coherentpolicy on saety and health in mines andlists some key steps to achieve this, theILO has asked member States to implementConvention No. 176 and consequentlyconsider denouncing Convention No. 45.While Convention No. 45 tried to protectwomen by excluding them rom mining, theprinciple o Convention No. 176 consists o

prevention and protection or both men andwomen.

There should be ree access or both sexes,complemented by strong occupational healthand saety standards, says Martin Hahn, amining sector expert at the ILO. ConventionNo. 45 had, inter alia, aimed to protect womenrom the then very substantial physical saetyand health dangers o underground mining.A lot o the work in the mines used to requiregreat physical strength, which people typically

didnt attribute to women. Nowadays, a loto the work in large-scale mining is done by

machinery, and saety and health records haveimproved considerably in well-run mines, headds.

Australias Mines and Minerals Association(AMMA) says 86 o its members areexperiencing skills shortages. The employerorganization believes recruiting women willplay a signicant role in addressing the issue,alongside increasing critical skills training andallowing more oreign miners into the country.

With 92 per cent o AMMA resource industryemployers stating they wish to employ morewomen, and being an industry where currentlyewer than one in ve workers are emale,

there are immense opportunities or Australianwomen to have a ullling and long-termcareer in the industry, the associationsChie Executive, Steve Knott, said at a miningconerence in June 2011.

Traditionally, mining in many countries hasbeen characterized by a strong macho cultureo risk-taking, which runs counter to modernoccupational saety and health approaches,says Hahn. Since this risk-taking culturewas ostered by the existence o a highly

homogenous workorce, more diversity shouldreally improve things.

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Decent workand educationA winwin combination

Technopolis

In 2003, Argentina became one

the frst countries to incorporate

the concept o decent work into

its national development agenda.

Since then, a number o governmentprogrammes have put into practice

dierent aspects o the Decent Work

Agenda. In 2004, Argentina and the

ILO teamed up to launch the Building

a Future with Decent Workproject,

which aims to promote and develop

the dignity o work in each person. As

the article explains, this is a road that

begins in the primary years at school.

Matas looks up rom the stage and smilesnervously. Looking back at him are hisclassmates and other students, as well asteachers, headmasters and governmentexperts. And, as i that wasnt enough tointimidate a 13-year-old boy, the Ministers oLabour and Education o Argentina have justwalked into the hall.

But Matas keeps his cool and, paper inhand, begins his speech with enthusiasm andeloquence. We want equal opportunities,

rather than some children being able to goto school while others are denied the sameprivilege, he says.

Beside him, 15-year-old Maira waits nervously.When her turn comes, she adds: We want ourparents to have decent jobs, so that childrendo not have to work.

Next up is a 20-year-old, also called Matas,who asks that schools be made aware o thesituation o children that work. To this end,

we are putting orward a proposal or a tutor-support system. School cannot be a placewhere one size ts all. We need schools thatcater or everyone.

Their proposals are part o the conclusionso the day organized around Thinking aboutDecent Work in Schools by the Ministries oLabour and Education o Argentina. More than600 students rom 15 secondary schools inthe suburbs o Buenos Aires took part in theinitiative, along with teachers, headmastersand teams rom both ministries.

The premise was simple: participants had tothink about the link between school and workand, more precisely, between school and the

work that students want to do. The top nationalauthorities or education and labour were thereto listen to their ideas.

Contrary to those that think that schoolsbecome distracted by addressing subjectssuch as sexual education, organ donation, ordecent work, we believe that when schoolsprovide teaching about sexual education anddecent work they are doing exactly what theyshould be doing, Minister o Education,Alberto Sileoni, pointed out.

The Labour Minister, Carlos Tomada, picked upon the students call or equal opportunities.The creation o that equality is a process that


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began in 2003. In addition to the ve millionjobs created since then, the project Buildinga Future with Decent Work is essential to thiseort, since we not only need to create jobs,

but we also need to create a culture o and anemphasis on decent work in new generations.

Building a Future

with Decent Work

The project Building a Futurewith Decent Work, reerredto by Minister Tomada, waslaunched in 2004 by thenational Ministries o Labour

and Education and the ILOCountry Oce or Argentina.The objective was, andcontinues to be, to promoteand instil the value o decentwork in individuals.

Despite its limited resources, providedpartly by the ILO but mainly by the State oArgentina, the project Building a Future withDecent Work has had a strong social impact.Its success is no doubt due to the signicance

o its objective and the commitment othe parties involved, says Marcelo CastroFox, Director o the ILO Country Oce orArgentina.

The projects achievements include training1,000 teachers on the course ExploraTrabajo Decente (Explore Decent Work);oering all middle-school social sciencesteachers in Argentina the opportunity toparticipate in the project Trabajarte, run by21 teacher training centres; incorporating theundamental principles and rights at work and

the concept o decent work into the middle-

school curriculum through a Resolution othe Federal Education Council; running aregional experience-sharing workshop, wherethe leaders and promoters o the project

in the region countries Argentina, Brazil,Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay discussed the

direction that the programmehad taken in each country.

The impact o this projectcan also be gauged by thesatisaction that Matas elton hearing his own wordsbeing taken up in the speechdelivered by the Minister oEducation: Young people

want schools that cater oreveryone. One concept thatstruck me, and which I amgoing to start using mysel,is that schools cannot take aone-size-ts-all approach,he said. School should

be a place or everyone. In other words, weshould not just have to t in as best we can,but rather it should be the best school oreveryone.

Young people greatly value the opportunityo being able to come here and meet theauthorities ace to ace, said one o theteachers who accompanied the students.At the end o the day, Matas and the otherstudents elt that they had been able to speakopenly and that they had been listened to.

The Thinking about Decent Work in Schoolday was much more than just another dayo talks and meetings. It provided anotherexample o how Argentina has made decentwork an integral part o its economic and social

development.

Technopolis

Technopolis


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The bitter tobacco plant

gives way to the freshnessof oregano

P.

Deloche/ILO

our home had been

badly damaged and

our harvest burntduring the war, so we

welcomed the ilos

assistance

Promoting oregano cultivation is part

o a comprehensive support package

launched by the ILO in 2008 to assist

socio-economic recovery in war-torn

southern Lebanon. Farah Dakhlallah,ILO Regional Outreach and Advocacy

Ofcer in Beirut, reports.

Not so long ago, Hassan Bazzis arm in thesouth o Lebanon grew lush every summer withthe tough and resilient green leaves o tobaccoplants.

But the work was hard and expensiveand could endanger health. What somearmers in the area had called the plant

o steadastness or its ability to providecash and survive decades o confict, wasincreasingly being called the bitter plantbecause o the challenges to growing tobacco.

Farmers were looking or an alternative, andthey ound one with the help o the ILO.Today, many o the bitter plants are gone,replaced by a resh green herb that is easier

and cheaper to arm, and even goes well witha variety o local oods and cooking, includingthe amous Lebanese condiment zataar, a mixo herbs, sumac, sesame seeds and salt.


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Oregano arming is the new ace o this areasdevelopment: oregano is easy and economicalto grow, doesnt damage anyones health, andsmells and tastes good. Promoting its cultivation

is part o a comprehensive support packagelaunched by the ILO, and unded by the LebanonRecovery Fund, in 2008 to assist socio-economicrecovery in areas o south Lebanon aected bythe 2006 July war with Israel.

I had long wanted to make a switch butwasnt aware o any viable alternative until ourlocal cooperative was approached by the ILOabout oregano production, says Hassan.

Hassan is making the transition because,

compared with tobacco arming, oregano islow-cost, consumes less water and requiresless eort. It can also be more protable:harvesting oregano instead o tobacco canlead to an annual income increase o 850,000Lebanese pounds (US$566) per amily.

However, diversiying crops and securingsales o new products like oregano remains achallenge.

Some 25,000 amilies in southern Lebanon

about 60 per cent o the population inthe south continue to rely on the state-subsidized tobacco sector or their livelihood.Because o the Governments long-standingprice support policy, tobacco is regarded bymany in the region as a secure selling crop providing the average armer with an annualincome equivalent to US$2,400.

Dire social and economicimpacts

But in addition to the well-known healthhazards linked to tobacco consumption,the bitter plant can have dire social andeconomic impacts.

Much o the worlds tobacco is armed bychild labourers, and Lebanon is no exception.Forty-one-year-old Hassan himsel has

worked since the age o seven on his amilys8,000-square-metre tobacco arm. Tobaccocultivation is oten a amily aair, leading tochildren being pulled out o school and women

being overworked. Over a third o Lebanonsestimated 100,000 child labourers work ontobacco arms.

Work in the tobacco sector is both labour-intensive and exhausting. Men, women andchildren endure long hours o stoop labourwhile suering rom exposure to nicotine andpesticides.

Whats more, tobacco arming also leads toenvironmental degradation: the use o wood or

curing contributes to deorestation; pesticidespollute the soil and water supplies; andthe great need or irrigation depletes waterreserves.

Besides its contribution to a greener economy,the ILO support programme is also intendedto help the rural areas o southern Lebanonrecover rom the July 2006 war.

Through 12 partner cooperatives, the ILO hastrained over 110 producers in 28 villages on how

to prepare the soil, plant and cultivate oregano,and has provided seeds and irrigation materials.The oregano plants also serve as aromatic fowersor the beehives being maintained by ILO-supported beekeepers nearby.

Besides oregano arming, the ILO programmealso supports olive arming, bee-keeping,livestock and shing; skills training or personswith disabilities to help integrate them intothe workorce; and capacity building or tradeunions, municipalities and cooperatives, andmicro-credit acilities.

Our home had been badly damaged and ourharvest burnt during the war, so we welcomedthe ILOs assistance. At rst, we planted onedunum (1,000 square metres) o oregano ona trial basis. Im now in my third season andhave dedicated hal o my land our dunums entirely to oregano, says Hassan.

DR


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Kenyan cooperativesells microinsuranceover the phoneThe decision by the United Nations

to declare 2012 as the International

Year o Cooperatives is bringing new

attention to a long-established, but

sometimes overlooked, orm o business

organization. The ILO views cooperatives

as important in improving the living

and working conditions o women and

men globally as well as in making

essential inrastructure and services

available. Andrew Bibby, a London-

based journalist, reports rom Kenya,where a cooperative insurer oers basic

insurance using mobile technology.

For street traders in Nairobi and Kenyas other

big cities, it is only necessary to key the shortcode *547# into a mobile phone to gain theelement o security which comes rom havingbasic insurance cover or such events assickness and accident. Premiums can bepaid in instalments, o as little as 20 Kenyanshillings (about US$ 0.2) a time, with themoney paid across automatically using thephones money transmission acilities.

Kenyas cooperative insurerCooperative Insurance Company

(CIC), introduced the acility to usemobile phone technology in thisway at the end o 2010, and itsManaging Director Nelson Kuria

35

CIC


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M.Crozet/IL

O

is passionate about the opportunities it isopening up or the vast majority o Kenyanswho have no insurance at all. He points out orexample that the ten million people workingin the inormal economy, including some othe most vulnerable and least able to copewith unexpected misortune, could benet

enormously rom access to microinsuranceproducts. But their incomes generallyfuctuate a great deal. We have to adjust totheir environment, he says.

Recent years have seen considerableinterest globally in the opportunities whichmicroinsurance can bring to help the worldslow-income amilies, by enabling them toprotect themselves against risk. The ILO hasbeen at the oreront o this work throughits Microinsurance Innovation Facility (parto the Social Finance Programme) and

the comprehensive publication Protectingthe Poor: A Microinsurance Compendium,published by the ILO in 2006, has beenollowed more recently by a series o detailedstudy and research papers on the subject, witha second volume to be published this year.

In the Kenyan context, as CIC isdemonstrating, it makes absolute sense topromote and provide microinsurance productsby using mobile technology. Cellular phoneusage has grown enormously quickly in recent

years, rom eight million phones in 2007 to19 million last year, in a country o about 40million people. The vast majority o users nowalso access the electronic money transmission

services introduced by the network companies,such as Saaricoms M-Pesa (mobile cash)acility. M-Pesa now has 14 million subscribersand 28,000 agents across the country.

This represents a tremendous shit in terms oaccess to nancial services, Nelson Kuria says,

pointing out that a very large percentage o theKenyan population can now, at least potentially,be removed rom a situation o nancialexclusion. His own companys service, whichuses the M-Pesa platorm, has been namedM-Bima, the Kiswahili or mobile insurance.

Cooperative insurer developedinto major player

CIC, which is under the control o Kenyascooperative movement, was once almost

insolvent and an insignicant presence in theKenyan insurance market. It has developed inrecent years into a major player, currently thirdout o more than orty insurers. Its premiumgrowth in its last nancial year was 58 percent and the strategic aim, at least accordingto Nelson Kuria, is to become the largestinsurer by the end o the decade.

The potential is so enormous. Arica has only2 per cent o total global insurance premiums,and 90 per cent o that is in South Arica.

Insurance penetration in Kenya is just 3 percent o GDP, Nelson Kuria says. The problem,he explains, is to help people to understandthe role which insurance can play to protect

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their amily and their assets. People on lowincomes have simply not been exposed toinsurance and generally have a low level onancial literacy, he adds.

One way in which CIC is trying to change thisis by working with Kenyas network o Savingsand Credit Cooperatives (SACCOs, a orm ocredit union). CIC arranges group lie insurancecover or loans, which is automatically includedwhen SACCO members borrow money rom theircooperative. CIC also has a range o insuranceproducts or armers, helping protect them romhazards including drought, fooding and re.

However, the introduction o M-Bima

potentially enables CIC to extend its reach.We need to be innovative and creative aboutcoming up with non-traditional channels odistribution, Nelson Kuria says. He addsthat microinsurance last year contributedabout 600 million Kenyan shillings to CICstotal premium income o 4.5 billion shillings.Among CICs current microinsurance oeringsis Jamii Salama, a mixture o dierentelements o insurance cover including death,uneral and accident cover which is designedor amilies. Small and micro-traders are

oered the policy called Biashara Salama,oering protection against re and thet,while CIC has also a specialist microinsuranceproduct, Jikinge, specically tailored orsecurity guards.

Bringing insurance to peopleat the bottom

CIC has developed into microinsurance,according to Nelson Kuria, partly because o itscommitment as a cooperative to social as well

as economic objectives. Bringing insurance topeople at the bottom o the pyramid does notbring quick prots, and other insurers are notinterested in it. It requires a lot o investmentupront and capital resources are scarce, heexplains. But he is optimistic that eventually

the development o microinsurance will bringsuccess. In the long-term microinsurance isviable, he maintains.

At the launch o the UN International Year oCooperatives, Pauline Green, President o theapex organization o the International Co-operative Alliance (ICA), said that cooperativeswere both successul businesses and agents orsocial progress.

For nearly two centuries, weve been helpingto reduce confict, build community cohesion,build skills and expertise, develop localleadership potential and support women.Cooperatives have been a powerul player

in embedding civil society across the world.They are businesses having a wider socialengagement as a core part o their DNA, shesaid. Data released by the ICA suggest thatthe top three hundred cooperative businessestogether turn over 1.6 trillion US dollars,equivalent to the worlds ninth largest economy.

Nelson Kuria sees a real opportunity tostrengthen the cooperative business sector,but only provided that coops stay true to theirhistoric mission and vision. Cooperatives

were ormed as a response to exploitation othe poor, the lack o opportunities, and theirexclusion. They gave the poor opportunities tocome together and be empowered, and to playtheir rightul role in society. For cooperatives,commercial success is important, but we arenot just prot-driven. Our social and economicobjectives reinorce each other, and make ourmodel very powerul, he asserts.

This is the message which has taken CIC toits present position in Kenyan insurance andwhich is driving its ve-year strategic plan or

development. The organization has recentlyannounced that it is considering moving intoneighbouring Arican countries, includingMalawi, Rwanda, the United Republic oTanzania and the new Republic o SouthSudan.

M.Crozet/ILO


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38 | May 2012, No. 74 | News

News

World faces a 600-millionjobs challengeThe world aces the urgent challenge o creating

600 million productive jobs over the next decade in order togenerate sustainable growth and maintain social cohesion,

according to the annual report on global employment by the

International Labour Organization (ILO).1

World aces a 600-million jobs challenge

Somavia puts the accenton youth employment

15th Asia and the PacicRegional Meeting

Global Employment


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May 2012, No. 74 | News | 39

Trends 2012

1 Global Employment Trends 2012: Preventing a deeper jobs crisis. Geneva, ILO.2 People who have decided to stop looking or work because they eel they have no chance at nding a job are

considered economically inactive (i.e. outside the labour orce) and are thereore not counted among the unemployed.This also applies to young people who choose to remain in schooling longer than they had hoped and wait to seekemployment because o the perceived lack o job opportunities.

Ater three years o continuous crisisconditions in global labour markets and againstthe prospect o a urther deterioration oeconomic activity, there is a backlog o global

unemployment o 200 million, says the ILOin its annual report.

The report also says that more than 400million new jobs will be needed over the nextdecade to absorb the estimated 40 milliongrowth o the labour orce each year. Whatsmore, the world aces the additional challengeo creating decent jobs or the estimated900 million workers living with their amiliesbelow the US$2 a day poverty line, mostly indeveloping countries.

Despite strenuous government eorts, thejobs crisis continues unabated, with one inthree workers worldwide or an estimated1.1 billion people either unemployed or livingin poverty, ILO Director-General Juan Somaviasaid at the launch o the report. What isneeded is that job creation in the real economymust become our number one priority.

The report says the recovery that started in2009 has been short-lived and that there arestill 27 million more unemployed workers

than at the start o the crisis. The actthat economies are not generating enoughemployment is refected in the employment-to-population ratio (the proportion o the working-age population in employment), which sueredthe largest decline on record between 2007(61.2 per cent) and 2010 (60.2 per cent).

At the same time, there are nearly 29 millionewer people in the labour orce now thanwould be expected based on pre-crisis trends.I these discouraged workers2 were counted as

unemployed, then global unemployment would

swell rom the current 197 million to225 million, and the unemployment ratewould rise rom 6 per cent to 6.9 per cent.

The report paints three scenarios or theemployment situation in the uture.The baseline projection shows an additional3 million unemployed or 2012, rising to206 million by 2016. I global growth ratesall below 2 per cent, then unemploymentwould rise to 204 million in 2012. In a morebenign scenario, assuming a quick resolutiono the euro debt crisis, global unemploymentwould be around 1 million lower in 2012.

Young people continue to be among the

hardest hit by the jobs crisis. Judging by thepresent course, the report says, there is littlehope or a substantial improvement in theirnear-term employment prospects.

Global Employment Trends 2012says74.8 million youth aged 1524 wereunemployed in 2011, an increase o more than4 million since 2007. It adds that globally,young people are nearly three times as likelyas adults to be unemployed. The global youthunemployment rate, at 12.7 per cent, remains a

ull percentage point above the pre-crisis level.

A.

Mirza/ILO


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40 | May 2012, No. 74 | News

3 Vulnerable employment is dened as the sum o own-accountworkers and unpaid amily workers.

ILO/APEX

The reports main fndings also include:

There has been a marked slowdown in the rate oprogress in reducing the number o working poor.Nearly 30 per cent o all workers in the world morethan 900 million were living with their amiliesbelow the US$2 poverty line in 2011, or about55 million more than expected on the basis opre-crisis trends. O these 900 million working poor,about hal were living below the US$1.25 extremepoverty line.

The number o workers in vulnerable employment3globally in 2011 is estimated at 1.52 billion, anincrease o 136 million since 2000 and o nearly23 million since 2009.

Among women, 50.5 per cent are in vulnerableemployment, a rate that exceeds the correspondingshare or men (48.2).

Favourable economic conditions pushed job creationrates above labour orce growth, thereby supporting

domestic demand, in particular in larger emergingeconomies in Latin America and East Asia.

The labour productivity gap between the developedand the developing world an important indicatormeasuring the convergence o income levels acrosscountries has narrowed over the past two decades,but remains substantial: Output per worker in theDeveloped Economies and European Union regionwas US$72,900 in 2011 versus an average oUS$13,600 in developing regions.

These latest gures refect the increasing inequalityand continuous exclusion that millions o workers andtheir amilies are acing, Mr Somavia said. Whetherwe recover or not rom this crisis will depend on howeective government policies ultimately are. Andpolicies will only be eective as long as they have a

positive impact on peoples lives.

The report calls or targeted measures to support jobgrowth in the real economy, and warns that additionalpublic support measures alone will not be enough tooster a sustainable recovery.

Policy-makers must act decisively and in a coordinatedashion to reduce the ear and uncertainty that ishindering private investment so that the private sectorcan restart the main engine o global job creation, saysthe report.

It also warns that in times o altering demand urtherstimulus is important and this can be done in a waythat does not put the sustainability o public nancesat risk. The report calls or scal consolidation eortsto be carried out in a socially responsible manner,with growth and employment prospects as guidingprinciples.


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May 2012, No. 74 | News | 41

Somavia puts the accent

on youth employment

At the recent World Economic

Forum in Davos ILO Director-

General Juan Somavia called

or a new policy paradigm to

promote inclusive job-rich

growth or the almost 75

million unemployed youth

aged 1524 worldwide.

Speaking at the panel on Avertinga lost generation at the Forum,Mr Somavia said the youthemployment crisis had reachedunprecedented and intolerabledimensions, with our out o 10unemployed in the world beingeither a young woman or man.

He said a major driving orcebehind the youth crisis was a slackin aggregate demand at the global

and, in some cases, national level.He said it was time to concentrateon pro-employment strategies oryouth that would eventually sustainconsumption, boost demand,promote growth and create morejobs.

This is not only an agenda orgovernments but also or thebusiness and private sector,Mr Somavia said, adding that thenumber one constraint or small and

medium-sized companies or hiringyouth is the lack o credit access.

The ILO Director-General alsoreerred to the critical role oeducation and training, especiallyin times o crisis, saying thatgovernments should work closelywith the private sector to reduceskills mismatches. Some CEOsattending Davos have commentedon the diculties o lling certain

posts despite high levels ounemployment.

Mr Somavia cited Austria,Denmark, Germany, Norway andSwitzerland, which oer dual

systems o apprenticeshipscombining school-based educationwith in-company training assuccessul skill-matchingexamples.

He also stressed the need toprovide a wide variety o incentivesto promote youth employment,such as hiring subsidies, trainingand retraining grants and services

to acilitate the transition tojobs, including career guidance,eective contacts with enterprisesand advice on how to prepare orinterviews.

In addition, he called or thepromotion o youthentrepreneurship and partnershipsbetween public employmentservices and private employmentagencies.

Recent innovative publicemployment programmes haveproven their eectiveness inproviding employment and socialprotection to youth living inpoverty, while creating small-scale inrastructure to increasethe productivity in disadvantagedeconomies (NREGA in India,and Expanded Public WorksProgrammes in Ethiopia, Kenya,Mali and South Arica).

According to Mr Somavia, youngworkers worldwide have lost aithin the current paradigm. The worldeconomy is simply not workingor them. This disenchantment isrefected in many ways, not leastthrough the youth protests thathave unolded in some 1,000

cities and 82 countries over thepast months.

The need or decent jobs, socialjustice and dignity, on the onehand, and anger against inequalityand greed, on the other, have beenat the oreront o these protestsand can lead to more political andsocial instability, Mr Somavia said,adding that a real transormationwas needed to reorm currentpolicies.

WEF

ILO/APEX

ILOPHOTO


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42 | May 2012, No. 74 | News

15th Asia and the Pacic Regional Meeting

Last December, representatives o

governments, workers and employers

rom Asian, Pacifc and Arab states

concluded a our-day meeting in Kyoto,

Japan, at which they discussed ways

in which the region could prepare

to counter the consequences o thecurrent economic uncertainty.

Recommendations to counteremployment consequences of

global economic turmoil

In conclusions adopted at the close o theILOs 15th Asia and the Pacic RegionalMeeting (APRM), delegates agreed thatemployment and support or decentwork must be at the heart o policies orstrong, sustainable, balanced growth and

development.

They called or policy packages (based on theILOs Global Jobs Pact) to promote equitable,jobs-rich growth. Essential to this wouldbe the involvement o the ILOs tripartiteconstituents (governments, workers andemployers organizations), eective socialdialogue and the promotion o collectivebargaining. Increased productivity should bethe oundation or improved living and workingconditions, rising incomes and more decentwork opportunities.

Measures to improve preparedness to dealwith a deteriorating global economic situationinclude support or sustainable enterprisesand employment-intensive investment,development o minimum wage systems, thebuilding o eective social protection foors,

promoting greener growth and green jobs, andpolicies to address issues relating to youthemployment and labour migration.

The APRM also looked at ways thatemployment and social policies can be appliedto relieve the eects o natural disasters, towhich the AsiaPacic region is particularlyprone. Delegates thanked the JapaneseGovernment or organizing a special sessionon this topic, which allowed them to shareknowledge and draw important lessons ondisaster response and employment policy.


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May 2012, No. 74 | News | 43

The meeting also hosted the Asian launcho the Bachelet Report, Social ProtectionFloor or a Fair and Inclusive Globalization,presented by one o the members o theAdvisory Group, Ms Sudha Pillai, MemberSecretary o the Planning Commission o India.Building eective social protection foors,in line with national circumstances wasamong the priorities identied in the APRMconclusions.

This region has been the worlds most

dynamic region, economically, but we havenot been getting enough jobs, decent work,rom this growth, said Sachiko Yamamoto,ILO Regional Director or Asia and the Pacic.Most developing economies in the regionhave working-age populations that are growingast, but oten we only see 12 per centemployment growth or 67 per cent o outputgrowth. So i output growth drops below 6 percent the region will not be producing enoughjobs to meet the needs o those looking orwork, particularly young people.

Even beore the current turmoil this growth wasunevenly shared and inequalities were increasing.This inequality threatens economic and socialprogress i it is not addressed, she added.

The tripartite partners noted the links betweenrecent developments in some Arab countriesand the consequences o social exclusion, lacko decent jobs and the d

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