A side event to the OECD Garment Forum featured an in-depth discussion on achieving a new supply chain industrial relations model for the textile and garment industry.

A journalist was killed and five workers were injured in Port-au-Prince on Wednesday when police opened fire on peaceful demonstrators opposing the amount of the wage increase announced by the government following weeks of protest.

Zimbabwean energy workers have written to their employer, the Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority (ZESA), stating that they are no longer able to report for work because of poverty wages.

While the tensions over Ukraine persist, IndustriALL Global Union and industriAll European Trade Union’s affiliates call for the de-escalation of the conflict and a peaceful solution.

70 years after ILO Convention 100 on equal remuneration was adopted, the gender pay gap remains at an average of 20 per cent across the world. The Covid-19 pandemic has increased the time it would take to close this gap from 99.5 years to 135.6 years.

Peru has become the fourth country in Latin America to ratify ILO Convention 190, after with Uruguay, Argentina and Ecuador, and the eleventh in the world. 

Malaysian electronics union EIEUNR is critical of the union busting taking place at Molex, where the employer is attempting to deny union members the right to collective bargaining.

With several oil and gas refineries closing and further closures planned, unions are calling on the South African government to intervene to save jobs.

Europe is running out of paper because Finnish forestry giant UPM refuses to negotiate with unions representing striking workers. The strike, which has been extended until at least 12 March, is costing the company up to €20 million per week and risks causing a supply chain crisis.

Unions at Coats operations around the world organized a global day of action on 11 February, calling on workers to join a union and the Coats global union network.

On Valentine’s day, 14 February, more than one hundred members of IndustriALL Global Union in the Asia Pacific region took lingerie brands Victoria’s Secret, Torrid and Lane Bryant to task, urging the brands to take responsibility for the workers in their supply chains.

IndustriALL Global Union has expressed its support for Haitian garment workers after police violently broke up a demonstration in support of demands for an increase in the minimum wage.

A damning news report on British television is accusing well-known household appliances company Dyson of forced labour, false imprisonment and dangerous working conditions at one of their main supplier factories in Malaysia, ATA Industrial.

On 31 January, a worker was killed in an accident at Kabir Steel shipbreaking yard in Sitakunda municipality, Chittagong, Bangladesh, while working at night – despite a court order prohibiting the practice.

Over 500 workers at the Dangote Industries Zambia Limited cement plant in Masaiti, outside Ndola, went on a wildcat strike 25-28 January to demand better wages and working conditions.

After a sustained campaign by Ittehad Labour Union Carpet Industries Pakistan (ILUCIP) and workers in the carpet industry, the Punjab Government in Pakistan announced a wage increase of 2,500 PKR (US $14.21) for industrial workers in June 2021. When employers failed to comply, workers took action.

On the first anniversary of the military coup in Myanmar, IndustriALL held a webinar with leaders from the global labour movement, as well as unions in Myanmar.

Ninety per cent of the 6,232 workers at General Motors’ plant in Silao in Mexico have cast their votes to elect new union representatives. With an overwhelming majority – 76 per cent – SINTTIA won, leading the way for democratic unions in Mexico in the wake of the country’s labour reform.

Several student leaders have been arrested while others allegedly tortured at police stations in Eswatini. Unions say over 100 people were shot dead, and hundreds injured and arbitrarily arrested in incidences where the police and the army used excessive force and live ammunition against prodemocracy campaigners.

Together with IndustriAll Europe, IndustriALL Global Union is calling on the EU to respond to the horrendous abuses of human rights in Myanmar by immediately withdrawing trade preferences under the EU’s Everything But Arms (EBA) system to cut off the military junta’s funding.