Decent Work and the Millennium Development Goals
In September 2000, governments around the world signed up to the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The goals encourage action by governments to lift millions of people out of poverty by the target date of 2015.
8 GOALS TO ACHIEVE BY 2015
- Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger
- Achieve universal primary education
- Promote gender equality and empower women
- Reduce child mortality
- Improve maternal health
- Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases
- Ensure environmental sustainability
- Develop a global partnership for development[
The Decent Work agenda contributes to all eight MDGs. The importance of Decent Work in achieving the MDGs was recognised by more than 150 countries at the United Nations (UN) World Summit in 2005.
‘We strongly support fair globalization and resolve to make the goals of full and productive employment and decent work for all… a central objective of our relevant national and international policies as well as our national development strategies, including poverty reduction strategies, as a part of our efforts to achieve the Millennium Development Goals.’ General Assembly Resolution 60/1, 16 September 2005
Extreme Poverty is clearly linked to a shortage of jobs and low wages, as well as homologous factors which constrain the livelihoods of informal workers including smallholder farmers. It is made worse by poor working conditions, abuses of workers’ rights and a lack of social protection.
Global unemployment reached a record high of 192 million people in 2005. Almost half of the world’s unemployed are young people aged 15 to 24. There are just under 500 million people in work but earning less than one dollar a day. Creating jobs is essential in the fight against poverty but decent work, including a fair wage, matters too.
One of the current targets for MDG1 – arguably the most important – is “to achieve full and productive employment and decent work for all, including women and young people.”
Health & Education The presence of child labour is invariably linked to adults not being able to earn a living wage and often a lack of schooling opportunities. The lack of quality health and education services is often due to a lack of investment in staff; primary school teachers in Brazil, Mozambique and many other developing countries earn the minimum wage or less, which is a major cause of low quality of education.
Gender equality MDG3 sets out to “promote gender equality and empower women. The globalised workforce is increasingly female, but many jobs on offer are precarious. Without decent work, women may have little job security (none at all if they are homeworkers) and face discrimination over access to work, wages and promotion and sexual harassment at work.
Global partnership for development Partnerships between governments, employers and workers are not only a way of improving working conditions and rights at work, such social dialogue strengthens democracies and promotes good governance. It also ensures that strategies for reducing poverty are responsive to the real needs of ordinary people.
Millions of workers are denied basic rights at work. They are forced to work long hours for little pay, and with no legal contract, can be laid off at the whim of their employer. People who fight for their rights are often dismissed or threatened. Every year, around 100 trade unionists are murdered for defending workers’ rights while over 1,000 are subjected to violent assaults and many thousands arrested. Promoting workers’ fundamental rights to set up and join democratic union organisations not only helps achieve decent working conditions, it is also fundamental to enable workers to contribute to social dialogue.
