29 November, 2010On December 7, 2010, IMF and ICEM will appear at COP16-WoW to promote a "fair, just, and binding" international agreement for a sustainable "Greener" future.
GLOBAL: November 29, 2010 is the opening day of the two-week long negotiations of the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP16) building towards the hope for a sustainable "Greener" future. The international trade union movement wants to play a role in this process to support a "fair, ambitious and binding" international agreement that will provide a framework for combating global warming, while at the same time safeguarding industrial development, employment and workers' rights.
In order to put forward a common industrial workers' position, the International Metalworkers' Federation (IMF) and the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM) will hold a joint event "Cutting Emissions - Transforming Jobs" on December 7 at the COP16 World of Work (WoW) Pavilion, which is organized by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC).
The joint event will focus on:
- Environmental Protection - the urgent reality of climate change, the cost of action versus the cost of inaction
- Sectoral Concerns - domestic activities/policies on sustainable jobs from respective unions, "greening" of existing jobs and creating decent, sustainable, new jobs
- Sustainable Jobs - good industrial policy is public policy in the public interest, sustainable jobs are decent, organized jobs
- Just Transition - the Copenhagen Accord Climate Fund and Just Transition, and the case for union access in the metal, chemical, energy and mining sectors
Here you will find some of the documents for distribution and discussion at the joint event including the following:
1. Leaflet "Cutting Emissions - Transforming Jobs":
2. Discussion Paper: "Anticipating Change and Building a Foundation for the Future":
3. ICEM-IMF-ITGLWF Declaration "Stronger Together-Fighting for a Sustainable Future"
4. Discussion Document towards a Climate Change Policy Framework for Africa (English only)
We hope that all of you who are attending the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP16) will join us at the event in support of our common union position!!
Also, you can find ITUC's position and our sister organization, European Metalworkers' Federation (EMF)'s document "From Copenhagen to Cancun -
climate change grounds metalworkers" towards COP 16 at following web sites;
ITUC: http://www.ituc-csi.org/what-do-we-want-in-cancun-just.html
EMF: http://www.industrialpolicy.eu/EMF/C2C
For further information, please contact Kan Matsuzaki, Director of Shipbuilding, Non-Manual Workers and climate change at the IMF at [email protected].