Reaching out to informal workers

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Unions wishing to organise informal transport workers may benefit from a major ITF research project looking at the challenges involved in recruiting these workers and serving their needs. Here, research coordinator Chris Bonner shares some preliminary findings of the project – which was nearing completion as TI went to press.

A majority of workers globally are informally employed, or are in non-standard employment relationships. This is especially true in developing countries, and for women. The overall trend is towards increasing informalisation of work, resulting in a growing number of workers with few, or no, workers’ rights and protections.

It is not always easy to define informality. The most recent definition of informal employment, by the International Labour Organisation, is wide. It includes both self-employment and waged employment, where the job is without secure contracts, workers’ rights and benefits or social protection. There are different degrees of informality and different levels of protection. This can be represented as a continuum, from informal to formal, unprotected to protected, embracing many different employment relationships.

New operators

In developing countries privatisation and deregulation, urbanisation, growing unemployment and poverty have resulted in the rapid growth of the informal taxi industry, which includes minibuses, buses, motor cycles, manual and auto rickshaws and tricycles and a range of associated informal, survivalist jobs.

In the goods transport sector, unions note the growth of informal truck operators employing workers without formal contracts, rights or benefits, including migrant workers. And there are many self-employed workers, or workers in disguised forms of employment, eking out a living by carting rubbish, carrying luggage, repairing tyres, selling petrol and so on.

Women workers are found most commonly in non-standard forms of employment, such as part-time and temporary work in administration and logistics, in call centres and on cruise ships. These jobs may or may not be informal. At the informal, survivalist end of the spectrum, women are most often located in support functions such as preparing and selling food to passengers, cleaning, processing and selling fish or petrol.

Informal transport workers share similar problems and have similar needs as other workers in the informal economy. Commonly they are excluded in law or practice from labour and social protection laws. They lack representation and voice and are unorganised or ineffectively organised. They have a large number of concerns, including job insecurity, low and insecure income, harassment and corruption by authorities, poor facilities, and no access to training.

While the extent is not clear, we know that transport unions are increasingly organising or intending to organise informal workers, and experimenting with different forms of organisation. This includes directly organising workers as members; organising existing associations of transport workers into the union and/or providing support for other transport worker organisations.

Challenges and strategies

Recruiting and retaining informal members is an important challenge for unions. They have to overcome many obstacles such as suspicion, mobility of workers, time constraints, low interest in unions, and inexperienced organisers. They are developing strategies appropriate to their context, but it is not easy.

One overarching challenge is that of financial resources. Many unions are unable to organise informal workers seriously because the income derived from subscriptions from such workers is low and erratic. To sustain organisation, unions organising in different sectors of the informal economy are using a range of strategies to supplement membership subscriptions, such as:

■ cross-subsidisation from formal members (where strong enough)

■ solidarity funding on an ongoing basis, and

■ project partnerships with governments, NGOs, and development agencies.

As yet we have little information on these strategies and how successful they are.

Established unions that are beginning to organise informal transport workers have to deal with a range of issues that fall outside of their traditional scope of operation – such as providing “business” advice and skills, running cooperatives or providing a broad range of social protection services. This often needs a change of mindset.

However, their experience in handling grievances, collective bargaining, and accessing powerful players and allies, can provide a strong base for effective organisation.

Chris Bonner’s report of the Organising informal transport workers: global research project focuses on four case studies in developing countries. It can be requested by emailing education@itf.org.uk and will be downloadable from the ITF's website at www.itfglobal.org. More details of the project can be found at www.itfglobal.org/education/global.cfm#inf

National Transport Workers’ Union, Philippines

A case study extract, by Clarence Pascual >>

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