Guyana making strides in labour – Webster tells ILO confab

Human Services and Social Security Minister Jenifer Webster said Caribbean governments must create an enabling environment that ensures resources are optimally and efficiently utilised, pollution minimised and livelihood opportunities created to accelerate progress across all sectors.
The minister made these remarks at the eighth International Labour Organisation (ILO) meeting of Caribbean Labour Ministers in Port of Spain, Trinidad.
The sessions opened on Tuesday under the theme, “The Caribbean and Labour 2013 and Beyond – Strengthening Decent Work for Development”.
Webster told her Caribbean counterparts that Guyana has made significant strides in recognising the Decent Work Country Programme, which was signed in April 2012.
“We have enacted the Occupational Safety and Health Act, and ratified the ILO Convention on Occupational Safety and Health. In the not too distant future, the Ministry of Labour will enact mining regulations to enforce safety procedures with respect to employers and employees within the mining sector,” Webster said.
Regulations
The minister revealed government’s intention to formulate regulations for the construction, forestry, manufacturing, and chemical sectors.
Further, regulations will be enacted for HIV/ AIDS in the workplace so that vulnerable persons would not be discriminated against or denied employment opportunities on the basis of status, Webster disclosed.
The human services minister pointed out that Guyana’s 2003 revised Constitution has as a fundamental right; equal rights and status in all spheres of economic and social life and the labour laws offer adequate protection against gender-based workplace discrimination.
Only recently, government approved the National Minimum Wage and a 40-hour work week for both private and public sector employees which details coverage for workers in all categories.
Webster disclosed that Guyana has also ratified ILO Convention 189 on domestic workers, creating the basis for decent work with respect to persons employed as household service workers.
She said Guyana has an effective tripartite body comprising 20 members, including six government representatives, employers, two trade union umbrella bodies and one representative from the state- run National Insurance Scheme, that meet frequently to discuss and implement labour regulations.
Under the decent work country programme, Guyana has held workshops in occupational safety and health with respect to mining and forestry, seminars on cooperatives throughout the country and a seminar on green jobs.
A “South-South” and Triangular Cooperation model was also developed to ensure the necessary transfer of skills and technology from Peru to Guyana.”
Since the world is grappling with challenges of averting catastrophic climate change and delivering social development, Webster stated that a move towards a low carbon economic growth path is being seen as the approach to deliver economic and social development, and environmental sustainability.
She added that creating new jobs, while reducing the environmental impact of economic sectors; reducing the need for energy and raw material, avoiding greenhouse gas emissions, minimising waste and pollution, and maintaining ecosystem services like clean water, flood protection and biodiversity are also key actions needed to address climate change.
The minister pointed out that climate-proofing the global economy will involve large- scale investments in new technologies, equipment, buildings, and infrastructure, which will provide a major stimulus for much-needed new employment and an opportunity for retaining and transforming existing jobs.
Benefits
However, Webster remarked that despite the potential benefits, a green economy and the benefits it will provide can have a profound effect on the way countries produce, consume and transform sectors.
She revealed that this transition will be the challenge which many developing countries will face.