Training cum Workshop on Challenges of Informal Economy for Trade Unions

Organised by Democratic Confederation of Nepalese Trade unions (DECONT)

31 May -01 June 2005, Janakpur, Dhanusha

Background

In developing countries like Nepal, the major sector of informal job is agriculture where around 80 percent of total population is involved. And, they still depend on traditional agriculture as main occupation since the development of industrial and modern technologies are very slow. At the same time, in Nepalese labour market, around 96 percent of labour forces are engaged in informal economy. The employers of formal sectors are enthusiast to convert formal workers into the informal one. In today's globalized world, the available formal jobs are also disintegrating into small informal pieces making more and more contracts and sub-contracts. The main employer in practice will not be responsible for the welfare of the labour engaged in workplace. Not only that, the skilled labor from cross-boarder are displacing the native labors since the native's approach to jobs and availability of skill promotion and vocational training is extremely poor. Therefore, the trend of employing contract labor in permanent work is ever increasing and the job opportunities are cut off in formal workplace thus pressurizing the flow of labor in informal economy.

In these circumstances, workers are coming forward for trade union and helping to organize the workers of informal economy. DECONT is very much worried about such workers' issues like how to integrate the workers of informal sectors into trade union movement, how to make them enthusiast and capable and how to protect their rights and welfare. By keeping the majority of workers out of trade unions' reach, the movement will not be able to represent the majority of workers. Due to this reason, DECONT is emphasizing the unionization of workers from informal economy from the beginning. And, in the year 2004, it had also organized a national level consultative workshop in cooperation with FES that submitted recommendations to organize programmes on informal economy at regional levels. As the follow up of that workshop, DECONT in cooperation with FES organized a training cum workshop on 'Challenges of Informal Economy for Trade Unions' on 31 May - 01 June 2005 at Janakpur, Dhanusha. Altogether, 35 participants from different affiliated unions of DECONT and also from district committees took part in the workshop.

Inaugural Ceremony

A brief inaugural session was organized and the chief guest for the ceremony was Bro. K. N. Dahal, General Secretary of DECONT and Bro. Dev Raj Dahal, Head of FES Nepal Office was present as special guest. Also presented at the occasion were Bro. G. S. Subedi, Central Member, Bro. Jitendra Lal Karna, General Secretary of Garment Workers' Union of Nepal (GWUN) and DECONTs' Dhanusha district committee officials. The session was chaired by Bro. Ram Dev Panjiyar, President of DECONT Dhanusha district committee. Addressing the session Bro. Dahal said that union should pay serious attention on organizing informal sector workers and highlighted the present situation of informal economy in Nepali context and identified the challenges for trade unions. Likewise, addressing the inaugural session Bro. Dev Raj Dahal said that DECONT from the beginning had started to work for the workers of informal economy and it is need of time that such efforts and initiation is very necessary for the rights and welfare of workers of informal economy. FES is supporting DECONT in those efforts. He also stated that it should be continued to keep up the trade union movement in the context of rapid globalization where formal economy is contracting very rapidly and that should be taken as opportunities or potential, not only as challenges or threat. Other speakers at the session were also emphasized the importance of such training to strengthen the workers of informal sectors.

Business session

After the inaugural session, a brief introduction session was held where participants, guests and resource persons introduced themselves on the basis of personal as well as organizational background. Thereafter, formal workshop was started with session on 'Overview of Informal Economy and Role of Trade Unions in Nepalese Scenario', It was facilitated by Bro. K. N. Dahal. He described about the background of informal economy, present situation of workforce in informal economy, problems of those workers, planning and strategic problems, opportunities and challenges for trade unions, initiation of DECONT in informal economy etc. He also put forward few policy recommendations for socio-economic reforms of the workers of informal economy. After the deliberation, an open discussion was also held for about 25 minutes in which 11 participants took part and expressed their experiences of local level.

The next session of the workshop was on 'Legal provision of informal economy' that was facilitated by Bro. Ghanashyam Subedi where he explained the nature of informal economy based on legal perspective, data on workers engaged in different sectors of informal economy, present legal status of labour and other legislation that, to some extent, cater the rights and issues of informal workers. He also discussed about the existing provisions both national and international and their shortcomings to address the rights and welfare of informal workers as well as few recommendations to reform the workers' status under the informal economy. Thereafter an open discussion was also held where 17 participants raised their concern on the legal aspects.

The next session of the day was on 'Challenges of Trade Unions in Informal Economy' that was facilitated by Bro. K. N. Dahal. In this session, he pointed out important challenges thrown by informal economy for trade unions. Thereafter, a group discussion was designed to collect the ideas and experience of union leaders regarding challenges informal economy for them at grass root level. Thereafter, the participants were divided into four groups and assigned the task to prepare group reports on the subject matter. The group discussion was facilitated by Bro. Dahal and Bro. G. S. Subedi jointly.

Second Day

Session of the next day was started with the presentation of group reports on challenges of trade unions in informal economy. All four groups presented their group discussions' outcome respectively. The discussion was also held on the group reports and the issues raised therein. After it, next session was started on 'Sharing experiences in organizing the unorganized', which was facilitated by Bro. R. K. Dev where he analyzed as to how the workers of varied informal sectors could be organized under trade unions' structure. During the session he also gave some examples of successful organizing strategies for informal workers in other countries as well as collected the participants' views about how we can enhance our capacities to organize the unorganized one.

The next session of the programme was on "DECONTs' Policies and Organizing Strategies for Informal Sectors" and this session was facilitated by Bro. K. N. Dahal. During the session he briefed about the policies adopted by DECONT to organize the informal workers and also activities carried out by DECONT through different national unions. He also highlighted the efforts of DECONT to strengthen the capacity building of such national unions. It has also been discussed about possible strategy to organize more and more workers from such sectors to make the trade union movement much stronger. Thereafter, an open discussion was held for around 25 minutes and 22 participants took part in sharing their experiences.

The last session of the workshop was on "Developing Future Action Plan for Organizing Unorganized Workers of Informal Economy" and that was primarily a brainstorming session where participants were asked to develop an action-oriented workplan to organize informal sector workers in their respective districts. The session was facilitated by Bro. Dahal and Bro. Dev. For the group discussion the participants were divided on the basis of representing districts and following tasks were assigned them for possible action plan:

1. List out the priority sectors under informal economy in their respective district.
2. List out the possible activities of unions for coming one year.
3. Target for organizing.

The participants were from 8 districts, namely Sunsari, Siraha, Mahottari, Dhanusha, Udayapur, Bara, Parsa & Makawanpur. All the districts presented their action plan of coming one year where they presented their plan to organize and strengthen informal sectors workers and unions. The activities are from organizing new members, renewing old members, forming/reshuffling of district committees of such unions, organizing campaigns, trade union education etc.

After the group discussion and report peparation, each group presented their report and was summed up by Bro. Dahal. The summary of the Action Plan is presented hereunder. Thereafter, a brief closing session was held where Bro. K. N. Dahal, Bro. R. K. Dev and Bro. G. S. Subedi emphasized that informal economy poses not only challenges instead it also offers immense opportunity. However, it is necessary to explore those opportunities by trade unions. And, they hoped that the formulated action plan could help to exploit those opportunities.

Group Discussion: 1

Outcomes of Group Discussion on Challenges of Informal Economy for Trade Unions