English

Español

Français

Aerospace

Automotive

Base metals

Chemical, pharmaceutical and bio-science

Energy 

Glass, cement, ceramic and associated industries

ICT, electrical and electronics

Mechanical Engineering

Mining and DGOJP

Pulp and paper

Rubber

Shipbuilding and shipbreaking

Textile, garment, shoes, leather and textile services

Sectors

Action Plan 2025-2029

Action on textile and garment industry

Clean up shipbreaking

Ratify ILO C176

United for a just future - time to pay up!

Disinvest from Myanmar

Campaigns

Global Framework Agreements

Union building

White-collar workers

Health & safety

Industry 4.0

Women

Youth

LGBTQI+

Gender, equality, diversity and inclusion (GEDI)

Just Transition

Organizing with industriALL 

What we do

Affiliates

Statutes

Elected officials

Executive Committee

Geneva head office

South East Asia 

Eastern Europe, Central Asia and the Caucasus

Latin America and the Caribbean 

Middle East and North Africa

South Asia

Sub-Saharan Africa

Regional offices

About us

Global worker No1 2022

Global worker No2 2022

Publications

Resources

Logos of IndustriALL Global Union

Press

With a Trade Union and Human Rights Conference scheduled for Kathmandu this weekend, 10-12 September, the 20-million-member ICEM has again protested loudly to the King of Nepal over actions taken by royal police to suppress free assembly and free speech in the Himalayan kingdom. 
 
In a letter today to King Gyanendra, ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs specifically referred to harsh actions by police yesterday and Sunday. Police used tear gas and brute force in the country’s capital to break up a march of political and Trade Union leaders, who were calling for full restoration of fundamental political liberties in Nepal. Some 400 leaders of Nepal’s seven political parties as well as leaders of Trade Unions, including ICEM affiliates, were arrested over the two days. In addition, 65 protesters on Monday were hospitalized due to unnecessary force by the royal administration on 5 September. 
 
“It has become obvious to the ICEM that King Guyanendra of Nepal is using an anti-corruption task force to repress political liberties and restrict universally accepted principles of free speech and free assembly,” said Higgs. “It also is obvious that this device is being used to restrict Trade Union activity.” 
 
In his letter, Higgs cited a statement by the king on April 30, 2005, lifting the state of emergency and authoritarian rule that Guyanendra had imposed on 1 February. “But you left in place a powerful anti-corruption panel and continued to ban free speech, assembly—most notably Trade Union meetings—and protests. It has become apparent to the ICEM and to the world that your lifting of authoritarian rule was not genuine, but rather a ruse to the outside world while still retaining a ban on free and democratic participation, particularly by trade unions.” 
 
Higgs pointed out that the ICEM, representing 420 chemical, energy, mining and other unions in 125 countries, will participate fully in the 10-12 September conference in Kathmandu aimed at producing an agenda toward restoration of full democracy. The conference, sponsored by national trade union centers and others in Nepal, is backed by global trade union confederations and will draw 1,500 participants. 
 
At last May’s Annual Executive Council meeting of the ICEM, global trade union leaders condemned King Gyanendra’s “irrational and unacceptable acts of denial to democratic rights and liberties.” The Global Union Federation’s Exectutive produced a resolution calling for five specific actions in Nepal: 
 
• Immediate restoration of democratic governing principals and acceptance of a representative, parliamentary system, and release of all detainees; 
 
• Withdrawal of censorship on media and guarantee of freedom of association and information; 
 
• For the G-7 governments, the EU, India, and the rest of the International Community, to focus on the problem of liberty and democracy in Nepal and to use political and economic influence to bring about peace and a return to full democracy; 
 
• For all civil societies of the World to mobilize and engage every possible means to wage campaigns and protests against the oppression of basic human rights in Nepal; 
 
• For strenuous work, together with Global Union Federations and other Trade Unions of the World to support Trade Unions in Nepal through assistance in union building and other measures until full democracy and complete compliance with international labour standards, particularly freedom of association, are rediscovered in Nepal.

ICEM Again Calls for End to Nepalese Repression

Placer Dome, the world's third-biggest gold miner, faces a global trade union campaign aimed at reversing the company's recently announced job cuts and pressing it to repair the severe environmental damage that it has caused in a number of countries where it operates. 
 
Gold mining workers' leaders from around the world unanimously adopted a resolution to that effect this afternoon, at the close of a World Gold Forum held in Durban, South Africa. The event was organised by the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM), whose membership includes gold mine workers on all continents. 
 
The forum also agreed proposals for safeguarding the future of the world gold industry as a whole. 
 
The World Gold Forum precedes the ICEM World Congress (Durban, 3-5 November). This will map out a trade union response to globalisation. 
 
Today's resolution was sponsored by South Africa's National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), which is campaigning for the reinstatement of 2,895 workers recently retrenched at Placer Dome's Western Areas joint venture near Johannesburg. The sackings represent a cut of around 40 percent in the company's South African workforce, and are a potentially explosive issue in a country which has an unemployment rate of about 30 percent. 
 
Seconding the action call was Australian mining union the CFMEU. In solidarity with the South Africans, CFMEU members will picket Placer Dome offices in Australia next Monday morning - just a few hours after an NUM rally at Western Areas on Sunday 31 October. 
 
Full text of today's resolution: 
 
 
Noting that: 
 
1. Placer Dome is a Canadian transnational having mining interests in many countries. 
 
2. Placer Dome has a terrible record of destroying jobs and the environment and a disregard for the communities, wherever they have invested, in pursuit of profits. 
 
3. The owners and management have a history of union bashing while projecting itself as the best gold mining company on the earth. 
 
 
Believing that: 
 
1. Global investment should be socially responsible and must not undermine human rights, trade union rights, the community and the environment. 
 
2. In those countries where investments are made, collective bargaining conventions must be respected. A balance between global rules and the scope of domestic regulation has to be struck. 
 
 
We therefore resolve that: 
 
1. Placer Dome be targeted for an international campaign by the ICEM. 
 
2. This campaign should entail demands on the reinstatement of retrenched workers in the Western Areas Gold Mine Joint Venture; and restoration of the environment destroyed in the Philippines, Chile, Peru, Papua New Guinea and Australia. 
 
3. Placer Dome be pressured to sign a Global Agreement on Industrial Relations with the ICEM. 
 
4. A solid foundation for this campaign be built by organising a workshop early in the year 2000 for representatives from countries where Placer Dome has operations. A common platform for worker rights and working conditions and a programme for international worker solidarity must be agreed at this workshop. 
 
5. Unions affiliated to the ICEM must, where necessary, make available organisers and leaders to give direct practical assistance to worker struggles and organise the unorganised in Placer Dome operations throughout the world.

Placer Dome: Unions Launch Worldwide Campaign

Click <a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/GoodyaerAsia2005.ppt" type="internal">here</a> for an ICEM Powerpoint presentation on the current world situation within the tyre market, the challenges for Goodyear and the regional problems for Goodyear in Asia.

ICEM Powerpoint presentation on Goodyear world-wide and Goodyear in Asia

This is the first issue of the e-bulletin on HIV/AIDS. The e-bulletin will be a regular feature in the ICEM’s information strategy on the pandemic. Emphasis will be on workplace issues. It contains news on international governmental organisation such as the ILO and its Programme on HIV/AIDS and the World of Work, The Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS – UNAIDS, the World Health Organisation – WHO and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. The e-bulletin features news from the ICEM and other Global Unions as well as business organisations. It also gives links to useful websites and materials for union activists who want to deepen their knowledge and broaden their activities to fight HIV/AIDS. 
 
ICEM affiliates are already engaged in a wide range of activities, some have formal agreements with companies; others run education and awareness programmes at the workplace. To spread the information on new agreements and campaigns and to build on best practices affiliates and project coordinators are invited to send news and information to hiv.aids@icem.org. Any feedback on the format and contents of the e-bulletin is also welcome. 
 
To subscribe to the e-bulletin, send an e-mail to press@icem.org. Please put ‘subscribe ICEM HIV/AIDS e-bulletin’ in the subject line. 
 
Unfortunately, the e-bulletin can only be published in English. For a free automated (non-ICEM) translation of this HIV-AIDS bulletin into other languages, you may want to try http://babelfish.altavista.com/tr or http://www.google.com/language_tools. 
 
 
Revised Statoil Global Agreement Contains HIV/AIDS Clause 
 
The ICEM and its affiliate NOPEF renewed the Global Agreement with the Norwegian gas and oil producer Statoil. The agreement, which was ICEM’s first when signed in 1998 and has since been reviewed and renewed twice, now contains a clause on HIV/AIDS. The clause stipulates that “the company provides a clear and supportive policy on HIV/AIDS and that this policy is effectively implemented throughout Statoil’s operations.” 
 
In the upcoming review of other Global Agreements and in new agreements, the ICEM will strive to include a clause on HIV/AIDS. 
 
 
Crucial Role of Business Fighting HIV/AIDS 
 
In an interview with Newsweek former US ambassador Richard Holbrooke, who is the CEO of the Global Business Coalition on HIV/AIDS, stressed the vital role of workplace interventions in the prevention and treatment of the disease. He stated that 95% of all the people in the world who are HIV-positive don’t know it and are therefore spreading the virus for the seven or eight years it lies without any symptoms in a person’s body. Without voluntary but highly encouraged testing and prevention, the amounts spent on treatment will be a bottomless pit. Companies have to get heavily engaged in prevention and treatment. 
 
While he conceded that Africa is at the heart of the problem, he emphasised that it is not just an African disease. The fastest growing rates of the disease are in countries such as Russia, the Ukraine and India, which because of its large population has the first or second largest number of victims already although the prevalence rate is still low. 
 
The Global Business Coalition on HIV/AIDS – www.businessfightsaids.org - has a wide range of case studies of the HIV/AIDS policies and interventions of its member companies. 
(Source: Newsweek, 15 August 2005) 
 
 
Global Fund Replenishment Meeting Falls Short of Target 
 
At the replenishment meeting in London at the beginning of September, government donors pledged USD 3.7 billion to the Global Fund. This commitment, which fell short of expectations, will be sufficient to pay for grant renewals during 2006 and 2007 after the two-year review period and also for the 2005 anticipated shortfall, but it will not cover the cost of any new rounds. The total needs, including cost of new rounds, had been estimated at USD 7 billion. It has to be said, however, that some countries could not yet commit themselves because of their budgetary cycles. Such late pledges and a further replenishment meeting in June 2006 might still bring the commitments to a level to allow for another round of financing. With a commitment of USD 600 million so far the US is well below its target of contributing one third of total funds committed. 
 
The relatively low level of support raises questions about the G8 commitment in July to place on antiretroviral treatment by 2010 all HIV patients who need it. In June the WHO reported that one million people received ARV treatment. The target of 3 million people on ART by the end of this year, the 3 by 5 Initiative of the WHO, is unlikely to be reached. 
 
(Source: Global Fund Observer Newsletter, Issue 50 of 7 September 2005) 
The GFO is an independent source of news, analysis and commentary about the Global Fund. The Newsletter is provided free of charge; to receive it send an email to receive-gfo-newsletter@aidspan.org. 
 
 
Mozambique/South Africa: Catastrophic AIDS Death Toll Among Miners 
 
The level of mortality from AIDS among Mozambican miners in South Africa has reached catastrophic levels, according to the Mozambican Deputy Labour Minister. In the last four years at least 2,500 Mozambican miners had died of AIDS. This figure almost certainly understates the true mortality, since it only includes known cases of the disease. There are currently about 46,000 Mozambicans working in South African mines. The article states that some South African mining companies have adopted discriminatory practices, immediately repatriating miners when they are known to have been infected. Miners who suffer this fate die in Mozambique and are thus not included in the South African figures. 
(Source: www.allafrica.com from Agencia de Informaçao de Moçambique, 13 September 2005) 
 
 
ILOAIDS Website 
 
Visit the website of ILOAIDS, which was re-designed in the course of the year. 
www.ilo.org/public/english/protection/trav/aids/index.htm. 
New features include a step-by-step guide to workplace action, a registration facility to keep you informed of events and new materials and a 24-hour news service focusing specifically on HIV/AIDS in the world of work. You can also find the ILO Code of Practice on HIV/AIDS and World of Work in some 20 languages.

ICEM HIV/AIDS e-bulletin - No. 1

Hundreds of thousands of Australian workers will take to the streets 15 November to protest the Howard government’s proposed reforms to industrial relations, reforms that are expected to be tabled in Parliament by late October. Called a National Day of Community Protest, the event is being coordinated by the Australian Council of Trade Unions and will feature a satellite link-up to hundreds of locations across Australia spelling out the loss of workers’ rights if the reforms are adopted. The nationwide Union Meeting, as it is billed, is expected to become a one-day national strike against the union-smashing measures being put forward by Prime Minister John Howard following the Conservatives new majority in the Parliament’s Senate.

Australians to Protest Labour Reform 15 November

New Zealand’s unions will embark on a third round of stop-work actions at Carter Holt Harvey’s (CHH) wood and paper operations starting tomorrow. ICEM affiliates Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union (EPMU) and the National Distribution Union are protesting the company’s inferior pay offers of 2.8% to 4%. NZ unions have set a minimum pattern of 5% across all sectors. On 12 September, workers at five CHH wood products plants and one paper converting operation engaged in one-day strikes, and subsequent rolling work stoppages occurred at other jobsites. Workers at one of the company’s pulp and paper mills—Kinleith—are also protesting a poor pay offer. A set of three-day talks between CHH and EPMU there concluded on 2 September with the company offering only 4% and less for some job classifications. The labour unrest comes when the 50.5% majority stakeholder of CHH, US based International Paper Co., has received a US$1.5 billion sale offer for sale to NZ’s richest individual, Graeme Hart and his Rank Group Investment Ltd. CHH’s board of directors, however, has recommended shareholders vote down the offer, saying it is 9.1% under the company’s true market value.

Carter Holt Harvey Targeted over Wage Deficiencies

ICEM Jordanian affiliate General Trade Union of Workers in Mining and Metal Industries has promised to strike if their demands are not met for deeds to 100 housing units built near the Shidiyeh Mines in Maan, Jordan. The union is demanding the housing be turned over to miners and their families, as promised by King Abdullah, before Jordan Phosphate Mines Co. (JPMC) is privatised, which is expected by the end of the year. The Jordanian trade union, protecting the rights of the 1,350 JPMC workers, warned it will stand firm on the housing rights issue as a precursor against curtailment of any set of rights or workers’ benefits once the company is privatised.

Jordanian Affiliate Demands Housing for Miners

As ICEM Thai affiliate EGAT-LU prepares for a 17 May public hearing to block privatising the nation's electric and water industries, the Brussels-based global union federation-on the request of EGAT-LU-has declared 24-28 May as "International Week of Action." Trade unions across the world are asked to express a visible means of support for EGAT-LU and other unions in Thailand that are resisting the government's rush to privatise the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand (EGAT). 
 
 
"The members of EGAT-LU, as well as members of the Metropolitan Electric-City Authority Union (MEA) and the Provincial Electric-City Authority City (PEA), have brought common cause to all citizens of Thailand in calling on the government to abandon this misguided privatisation effort," said ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs. 
 
"The ICEM has pledged to the Thai unions that it would keep workers around the world informed of their struggle and would continue the expressions of solidarity. Throughout the last week of May, we're asking the world's trade unions to take direct action." 
 
Specifically, ICEM is calling on unions to write protest letters to the Thai embassies in their countries, and to plan demonstrations at those embassies in support of the agenda of EGAT-LU, MEA and PEA. Unions are encouraged to utilize other innovative means of protest to the Thai government as well. 
 
In Thailand, the unions will also observe the week by bringing mass numbers of rural citizens to picket lines in front of EGAT; the unions with consumer groups will coordinate protests outside the offices of the IMF and World Bank in Thailand; the use of yellow ribbons will increase as the symbol against privatising essential public services; and industrial actions will escalate, although the unions remain steadfast that electricity supplies will be maintained. 
 
The 17 May public meetings in Bangkok before the Senate Commission of Inquiry will be the first public hearings since January and February when the government sent low-level bureaucrats to staff the hearings. At a hearing 25 January at EGAT offices in Bang Kruai, many EGAT-LU members were denied the opportunity to speak, resulting in a demonstration and abrupt halt to the hearing when workers walked out. 
 
EGAT-LU, MEA and PEA are seeking adherence to a 23 April memorandum between the unions and the new chairman of EGAT stating that privatising state utilities of electricity and water will not occur, and the State Enterprise Act of 1999 that enables the privatisations be abandoned. Prime Minister Thaksin Sinawatra negated that commitment on 26 April by announcing privatisation would go forward. 
 
The unions also seek a return to negotiations where they are prepared to propose new and broader efficiencies for the utilities. The unions also will spell out corrupt practices inside the utilities such as the insider trading schemes and other irregularities, and ask for full disclosure on government plans to expand EGAT into Laos and Burma, as well as clarifications on IMF loans and the conditions of those loans. 
 
The ICEM asks that global trade unions cover those points in letters to Thai authorities. The unions have adopted the theme "Don't Sell Us Out" as their battle cry for this phase of the escalating campaign to block privatisation inside Thailand.

Global Week of Action to Support Thai Electric Union

The ICEM's Executive Committee, the global union federation's governing body, interrupted its annual session in Brussels today to stage a demonstration at the Embassy of Thailand in Belgium. Some 120 trade union leaders from 40 countries converged on the embassy in protest against the government's continued privatisation push of the nation's electric and water services. 
<img height="228" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/themb1s.jpg" width="350"/>
The noon-hour demonstration was part of an "International Week of Action" on behalf of ICEM affiliate EGAT-LU and Thai unions Metropolitan Electric-City Authority Union (MEA) and Provincial Electric-City Authority (PEA). The unions have succeeded to date in delaying the privatisation of the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand (EGAT), but the government of Prime Minister Thaskin Shinawatra is still intent on making EGAT a publicly traded company. 
<img height="158" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/themb2s.jpg" width="350"/>
 
After pushing up to the door of the Thai embassy with letters of protest from their respective unions, Brussels police informed the ICEM's union leaders that a 50-meter distance rule exists on mass assembly in front of a nation's foreign mission. The delegates then crossed a boulevard and ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs, President John Maitland and ICEM Vice President Paul Lootens from AC/CG-FGTB in Belgium entered the embassy with the letters. 
 
"We were received by the first secretary of the embassy in the absence of a Thai ambassador in Belgium at this time," said Higgs, who visited the ongoing protests by the Thai unions in Bangkok in late April. "We were able to convey the views of the international trade union movement on the Thai government's intent to privatise and the officer assured that responses to the letters would be forthcoming." 
 
ICEM affiliates throughout the world used 24-28 May as a week in which to register their protests with Thailand over the privatisation matter. 
 
In Thailand, the week of action produced more protests and more direct action against the government's plans.

Protest at Thai Embassy in Brussels over Privatisation

A fter five days of attempting to persuade corporate officials of a Taiwanese firm in intervene in a longstanding American labour dispute, five trade union members and representatives of Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical, Energy (PACE) Workers' Union, an ICEM affiliate, launched a hunger strike in Taipei today. 
 
The US unionists have been locked off their jobs in Ponca City, Oklahoma, by Continental Carbon Co. (CCC), a subsidiary of the giant Koos Group of Taiwan, since 8 May 2001. The PACE contingent arrived in Taiwan on Monday expecting a meeting with senior members of the Koo family to resolve the dispute. They did meet 10 June with company officials from China Synthetic Rubber Co. and Taiwan Cement-the two Koo companies that control carbon black producer CCC-but a second meeting with senior officials of the Koos Group was denied. 
 
Instead, the Taiwanese conglomerate issued a statement on the visit by the American trade unionists, accusing them of distorting the truth about the lockout and environmental problems surrounding the Oklahoma plant. "Such action has misled the people of Taiwan and has caused great harm to the reputation and public image of our two companies," the statement read. "With this in mind, we have asked the Taiwan government and law enforcement agencies to use all available legal means to protect the interests of our companies." 
 
The hunger strike by PACE members still legally employed by CCC and union representatives began after the Annual General Meeting of Taiwan Cement where the US visitors together with Taiwanese supporters staged a protest. 
 
"We are appalled that a company will call upon all the instruments of the state in order to silence legitimate protests by people whose livelihoods are at stake," said ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs. "We are confident that Taiwanese officials will not be provoked by such rash and hostile statements." 
 
The Taiwan Confederation of Trade Unions (TCTU) is giving local support to the American protestors. Earlier in the week, the PACE members and representatives, together with the TCTU, met with officials of the Taiwanese labour ministry and officials of the Ministry to Foreign Affairs to explain to them the circumstances surrounding the three-year lockout in Oklahoma, as well as environmental lawsuits against CCC brought by PACE and the Oklahoma's Ponca Tribe of Native Americans.

US Unionists Begin Hunger Strike in Taiwan

Archive