Systems of social security and labour laws (and their enforcement) need to be extended and adapted to the national context, including providing a basic income to all people in need of protection and adapting protection to cover workers in informal employment and to adjust to the rapidly changing work environment.  Key areas include healthy and safe working conditions and policies on wages/earnings, hours and other conditions of work, to ensure a just share of the fruits of progress to all and a living wage to all workers. 

Half the world’s population has no welfare protection. In many countries, neither employers nor the government provide financial support to workers who fall ill, are pregnant or unemployed. The majority of workers in developing countries are employed on an informal basis, and many of the jobs created in global supply chains are informal or ‘precarious’ in that workers do not enjoy normal protections or benefits, including retirement pensions.  Women are particularly likely to be informally employed, whether as homeworkers, domestic helps, or temporary workers at harvest time on farms. 

With no safety net, these workers are highly vulnerable throughout their working lives, and will face an impoverished old age, through not having accrued pension benefits.  By extending rights and social protection schemes to workers in informal and precarious employment, the provision of decent work is both a means of reducing their vulnerability, and a sustainable remedy for those in need. 

Key resources:

Helpage International (2009) Working for life: making decent work and pensions a reality for older people

Solidar (2008), Investing in people to invest in the future – Briefing on Decent Work and Social Protection 

Social protection pages from UK Department for International Development

Social protection pages from the ILO

Development Research Centre (2007): Social Protection and Internal Migration in Bangladesh: Supporting the Poorest

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