In Honduras, where nearly all 19 union organizations in the garment sector have negotiated collective bargaining agreements that significantly boost wages and provide benefits like free transportation to and from work and educational funds for workers and their children, these successes were achieved “with active women’s participation and leadership,” says Eva Argueta, coordinator of organizing… [READ MORE]
Just as the magnitude of the COVID-19 pandemic highlights the massive global economic and social inequality around the world, with workers in the informal economy and supply chains, and migrant workers—many of whom are women—especially marginalized, so, too, does it offer the potential to build more equal, inclusive and sustainable economies and societies that are… [READ MORE]
The COVID-19 crisis is especially devastating for the 50 million workers who make clothes, shoes and textiles in factories around the world. With declining sales, corporate retailers are canceling orders and factories are laying off workers, most without pay. Those forced to work often must do so in unsafe factories to support themselves and their… [READ MORE]
In Ukraine, as workers face employer efforts to shortchange their pay, lay them off or take other adverse actions during the COVID-19 crisis, many are turning to Labor Initiatives, a Solidarity Center-supported Ukrainian NGO that provides legal assistance to workers. Teleworking from home under Ukraine’s COVID-19 quarantine, the six-member staff, along with eight legal student… [READ MORE]
Across the Middle East and North Africa, unions and worker associations are mobilizing to educate workers about their rights during the COVID-19 crisis, provide them with resources to protect themselves and their families, and push for fair treatment at the workplace. The Kuwait Trade Union Federation (KTUF) convened a meeting in recent days with leaders… [READ MORE]
Maquila workers in El Salvador and Honduras are challenging employer attempts to use the coronavirus as a way to cut wages, layoff workers and even stop worker efforts to form unions. In Honduras, after the government on March 15 barred groups larger than 50 from gathering to stem the spread of COVID-19, most maquila employers… [READ MORE]
As long-time union activists helping domestic workers form unions and get a voice on the job, Andrea Del Carmen Morales Pérez and Librada Maciel found themselves fighting burnout—from stress, from nonstop work and from unrecognized trauma they carried with them for decades after the abuse they experienced cleaning homes and caring for employers’ families. But… [READ MORE]
Domestic workers in Honduras increasingly are exercising their rights on the job in the country, where they have few labor law protections and so are especially vulnerable to abuse. More than 100 workers recently joined SINTRAHO (Sindicato Nacional de Trabajadoras del Hogar), National Domestic Workers Union, which in October became the first legally registered domestic… [READ MORE]
As the novel coronavirus spreads, unions and worker associations around the world are demanding safe and healthy conditions for workers who must remain on the job, and that they be compensated during forced work site closures and not laid off to ensure high returns for corporate shareholders. The following is a small sample of union… [READ MORE]
In Bangladesh, garment workers often seek to form unions and worker associations to better protect against wage theft, unfair treatment and lack of health and safety protections, including large-scale safety threats like building collapses. Yet they increasingly are being denied the ability to do so because of an intensifying anti-worker environment…
