26 July, 2010
The 14-year exchange and engagement between ICEM and the All China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU) took a major step forward recently when a 13-member ICEM delegation, led by President Senzeni Zokwana, visiting Beijing for top level meetings with several leading ACFTU officials.
The 15-16 July meetings, attended by 45 people, found discussions centering on the theme “The Global Crisis and Job Protection.” The meetings mark a new crest in ICEM-ACFTU relations, following participation by ACFTU representatives in ICEM Asia-Pacific activities this year. The activities include the regional committee meetings in Sydney, Australia, in April, and an electricity network meeting in Korea.
In the near future, ACFTU representatives will take part in an oil and gas workers’ workshop in Vietnam in August and a pharmaceutical unions’ workshop in Indonesia in September.
The mid-July Beijing forum opened with presentations by Zokwana and Jiang Guangping, ACFTU’s Director-General of the International Department, who welcomed the ICEM by stating engagement with an active industry-based Global Union Federation is crucial to the ACFTU.
ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda gave reports related to Contract and Agency Labour, ILO Convention 176 (the Health and Safety in Mines Convention), Sustainable Development and Just Transition efforts, Global Framework Agreements, and Social Dialogue initiatives. Chinese industry sector leaders then reported on coal, electric power, petroleum, petrochemical, chemicals, pharmaceutical, and land resource matters in China.
Other ACFTU officials that lead structures within the Chinese Defense Industry, Postal and Telecommunications Workers’ Union, the Chinese Finance, Commerce, Light Industry, Textile and Tobacco Workers’ Union, and the Machinery, Metallurgical and Building Materials Workers’ Unions also gave reports.
Participants shared country experiences on trade union actions, and also discussed plant-level responses and solutions regarding for job protection. Germany’s Petra Kronen, for instance, the head of the Works Council and a supervisory board member of Bayer, explained flexible work-time arrangements taken between her union, IGBCE, and Bayer in order to avoid layoffs during the financial crisis.
Besides Zokwana and Warda, the ICEM delegation consisted of ICEM leaders from several affiliated unions, including: Per Sörensen of 3F Union, Denmark; Mats Svensson of IF Metall, Sweden; Michael Mersmann and Petro Kronen of IGBCE, Germany; Isidor Boix of FITEQA-CC.OO, Spain; François Laurent, CSC Bâtiment, Industrie & Energie, Belgium; Yoshio Sato of ICEM-JAF, Japan; Ian Murray of Construction, Forestry, Mining, Energy Union (CFMEU), Australia; and Robert Reid of the National Distribution Union (NDU), New Zealand. Also in attendance were Kemal Özkan, ICEM Chemical and Rubber Industries’ Officer, and Phee Jung-sun, ICEM Materials Industries’ Officer and Regional Contact Person for Asia-Pacific Region.
The ACFTU officials participating included Zheng Chengfu, President of the Chinese Energy and Chemical Workers’ Union; Fang Dan, Vice President of Chinese Defense Industry, Postal and Telecommunications Workers’ Union; Cai Ruixia, Vice President of Chinese Finance, Commerce, Light Industry, Textile and Tobacco Workers’ Union; Ma Hua, Director of Chinese Machinery, Metallurgical and Building Materials Workers’ Union; Zhang Jianguo, Director General of the Collective Bargaining Department of the ACFTU; Enyi Xu, Vice Chairman of the Chinese Energy & Chemical Worker’s Union; Guo Wencai, Director General of ACFTU’s Organizing Department; Xie Liangmin, Deputy Director General of the Law Department of the ACFTU; and Chen Jieping, Deputy Director of ACFTU’s Social Security Department.
A full and detailed report on the mission, prepared by the ICEM’s Özkan, can be found here.