ISSN 1811-1351 №# 1 2 (20) (21) МАРТ JUNE 2005 93rd annual Conference of the ILO concludes its work On June 16 Conference of the International The Conference marked the fourth World The Committee on the Application of Stan- Labour Organization concluded its 93rd annual Day Against Child Labour by calling for the dards noted with respect to freedom of associa- session. The annual Conference of the ILO drew elimination of child labour in one of the world’s tion in Belarus that no real concrete and tangible more than 3,000 delegates, including heads of most dangerous sectors – small-scale mining and measures had been taken by the Government to State, labour ministers and leaders of workers’ quarrying – within five to 10 years. comply with the recommendations of the ILO and employers’ organizations from most of the Confronted with record levels of youth un- Commission of Inquiry. As details of a govern- ILO’s 178 member states. employment in recent years, delegates from ment Plan of Action on freedom of association They discussed the need for urgently elimi- more than 100 countries discussed pathways to were not known yet, the Committee urged that nating forced labour, creating jobs for youth, decent work for youth and the role of the inter- an ILO mission be sent to Belarus, to assist the improving safety at work and tackling what ILO national community in advancing the youth government and also to evaluate the measures Director-General Juan Somavia called a “global employment agenda. The Committee also en- that the government has taken to comply with jobs crisis”. couraged the ILO to continue playing a leading the recommendations of the Commission of The annual meeting also focused on the role in the UN Secretary General’s Youth Em- Inquiry. situation of workers in the occupied Arab territo- ployment Network (YEN) and to extend the The General Survey discussed by the Con- ries, the state of labour standards in Belarus, YEN to other countries, both developing and ference Committee this year, was on working Colombia and other countries and the on-going developed. time. Delegates discussed the current state of situation of efforts to stop the use of forced la- In the absence of a quorum for the vote on a working hours and how to balance the need for bour in Myanmar. proposed Convention on work in the fishing flexibility with protecting workers’ security, The 93rd International Labour Conference sector, the Conference asked the Governing health and family life. adopted a program and budget of US$594.31 Body to place a corresponding item on the During a special sitting of the plenary of the million for the 2006-07 biennium. agenda of the Conference in 2007, and that the Conference, delegates held an in-depth discus- The new program and budget focuses on report submitted to the Conference plenary be sion on the situation of the more than 12 million decent work as a global goal and action needed used for further consideration. people around the world who are trapped in at the local, national, regional and international The Committee on Safety and Health con- forced labour, including some 2.4 million who levels to make it happen, including Decent Work sidered a promotional framework in the area of are victims of trafficking. They strongly con- Country Programmes. occupational safety and health. Delegates de- demned forced labour as a violation of human The Conference also selected new govern- cided that the instrument establishing this frame- dignity and supported the ILO Director- ment, employer and worker members of the work should take the form of a Convention sup- General’s call for a Global Alliance to address Governing Body. plemented by a Recommendation. this global problem. ■ On the sidelines of the 93rd International for Russia. Only one in four labour migrants stan’s youth. For urban youth new jobs are Labour Conference we interviewed Tajiki- works legally there, while most are employed created in the industrial, construction and stan’s Labour and Social Welfare Minister illegally. The authorities do their utmost to trade sectors. In 2004, about 100,000 new Zokir Vazirov: help migrants get legal employment. Tajikistan vacancies emerged, and over the first five - I arrived at the Conference with a special has already ratified an agreement on the so- months of this year - another 50,000. feeling. Firstly, this is the first conference I cial protection of Tajik citizens in Russia and Tajikistan needs ILO’s support for the profes- attend in my current capacity. Secondly, high of Russian citizens in Tajikistan. sional training and retraining of young spe- on the Conference’s agenda were forced la- Youth employment is one of the sharpest cialists, creating employers‘ associations and bour and youth employment issues. Both are youth policy problems in my country, where retraining staff of the country’s Labour Minis- very important to Tajikistan. the average age is 24 years. The government try and the Trade Unions Federation and wel- Every year 400,000 people leave the coun- grants land plots to young residents of rural comes the idea of creating a global alliance try in search of a job. Over 90 percent head areas, who represent 75 percent of Tajiki- against forced labour.■ A Global Alliance Against Forced Labour ILO released a major new study entitled “A steady demand for a cheap work force and cent are indebted to their employers and cannot Global Alliance Against Forced Labour” that denies it any social guarantees. sever labour relations of their own free will. says at least 12.3 million people are trapped in Russia is witnessing a growing influx of forced labour around the world, including such labour migrants, mainly from neighbor- 210,000 people in transition countries. At least 12.3 million people ing countries – the CIS member-states, China, are trapped in forced labour The report also provides the first global Vietnam and Korea. Flaws in migration legis- estimate of the profits generated by the exploi- lation are many and the chances of getting around the world, including tation of trafficked women, children and men – legal employment slim. Illegal labor migra- 210,000 people in transition tion to Russia, mainly from the CIS and South- US$ 32 billion each year (including US$3.4 countries. billion in transition countries), or an average Eastern Asia, makes up about 4-5 million. of US$ 13,000 from every single trafficked The ILO Report clarifies that forced labour On average, 22 percent of women- forced labourer. certainly cannot be equated simply with low migrants say they are sexually exploited. wages or poor working conditions. It com- We asked Elena Tyuryukanova to com- These figures testify to existence of slave la- prises two basic elements: the work or service ment . Ms. Tyuryukanova is a leading re- bour. search worker of the Institute for Socio- is exacted under the menace of a penalty, and Economic Problems of Population at the Rus- it is undertaken involuntarily. This can take Russia has begun the struggle against hu- sian Academy of Sciences. She supervised the extreme forms such as physical violence, but man trafficking by complementing its Crimi- research entitled “Forced Labour in Modern also subtler forms such as confiscation of iden- nal Code with an article on human trafficking Russia. Illegal Migrants and Human Traffick- tity papers or threats of denunciation of irregu- and slave labour at the beginning of 2004. ing.” conducted by Russian experts at the lar migrants to the police authorities, which However, this was only the first step. leads to increased exploitation. request of the ILO in 2004. A global alliance against forced labour Forced labour is a very acute problem in In this context forced labour in Russia has strategy introduced in the ILO new report Russia. Although the GDP growth rates have become a common occurrence. First and fore- requires an active response from national gov- been high for the past few years, poverty re- most, it concerns migrants, who are illegally ernments and social forces. employed in the shadow and informal econo- mains massive: the incomes of 27 percent of At present, Russia is ready to become an ac- mies. According to an ILO survey conducted the population are below the subsistence level. tive member of this alliance and continue co- in Russia, 47 percent of labour migrants have Low incomes do not allow large groups of the operation in the eradication of forced labour, to work on uncertain wage conditions or with- population to get proper education and health- its roots and spread. ■ care. out any wages at all, 71 percent have to work to exhaustion, and 51 percent are forced to do The report “A global Alliance Against Forced The shadow economy accounting for 10 jobs they had not agreed to voluntarily. Labour” was published at 1300 on May 11 million employees and 22 percent of the GDP Around 30 percent of migrants are denied 2005 by the ILO. For more information visit: is a vast field for illegal human exploitation freedom of movement and are partially isolated http://www.ilo.ru/news.htm (June 2005) practices, including human trafficking and from society, 20 percent have had their pass- forced labour. It also creates and maintains a ports confiscated by the employer, and 12 per- ILO meeting on Global Compact On May 26 the ILO hosted at the National labor. To solve this problem and increase em- Hotel in Moscow a Global Compact meeting for ployers’ responsibility, the enterprises employ- Announced by UN Secretary-General Kofi representatives of the all-Russia employers’ un- ing foreign workforce decided to work out a code Annan at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in January 1999, and ions, whose member enterprises employ foreign of business ethics.