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LABOUR: Sorting Garbage - Green and Dignified Work
By Mario Osava
RIO DE JANEIRO - More than 1,500 representatives of waste recyclers from 13 countries, and thousands of other visitors, including the host country Brazil's left-wing President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, met last week in São Paulo, demonstrating that they are no longer pariahs in our throw-away society.
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BOLIVIA: Amazon Nuts at Exploitative Prices
By Franz Chávez*
LA PAZ - Bolivia is the world's leading exporter of the shelled Brazil nut, a nutritious food source that grows abundantly in the country's Amazon rainforest region. But in this tropical paradise, many of the nut-gatherers live in hellish conditions.
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LATIN AMERICA: Strides and Setbacks for Domestic and Rural Workers
By Daniela Estrada*
SANTIAGO - In the last few years, several Latin American countries have attempted to improve labour conditions for rural workers and domestics, whose labour rights have long been ignored. But the new laws, even those with limited scope, are not always enforced.
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PARAGUAY: Health Insurance for All (Registered) Domestics
By Natalia Ruiz Díaz
ASUNCION - It took 42 years for social security health care coverage for domestics to extend beyond the limits of the Paraguayan capital.
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BALKANS: Strike Wave Sweeps Serbia
By Vesna Peric Zimonjic
BELGRADE - A very hot summer of workers' discontent has taken over Serbia. Some 33,000 people go on strike daily in 40 to 45 firms, according to union statistics. They are mostly employees of privatised companies who have not been paid salaries or social and health security benefits for months now.
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Q&A: A Second Chance – As Advocate for Women Migrants in Argentina
Marcela Valente interviews NATIVIDAD OBESO
BUENOS AIRES - In her 48 years, Natividad Obeso has already lived several different lives. There was the time when she lived in her native Peru as a successful businesswoman and mother of four. Then there was the time when she spent her days wandering the streets of the Argentine capital, penniless and alone, a fugitive of political persecution that she never understood.
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RIGHTS-PARAGUAY: NGO Offers Girls a Way Out of Sexual Exploitation
By Natalia Ruiz Díaz
ASUNCIÓN - Claudia was 13 years old when she came to the capital of Paraguay from her small rural town. Just a few weeks after her arrival she was wandering the streets of downtown Asunción, a victim of sexual exploitation.
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LABOUR-GUATEMALA: Domestics Finally Gain (Limited) Rights
By Danilo Valladares
GUATEMALA CITY - "What really hurt was that they refused me my right to rest before and after I had my baby. Even when my contractions started, they wouldn't let me go to the hospital," said Mildred Díaz, a Guatemalan domestic employee, talking about the worst aspects of her job.
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URUGUAY: Eight-Hour Day for Rural Workers
By Dino Cappelli
SARANDÍ GRANDE, Uruguay - Seventy years old now, Mr. Arrúa lives a comfortable enough life in Durazno, a town in central Uruguay. But he still remembers when his father took him to work as a farmhand when he was only nine.
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LATIN AMERICA: While Women Pull Double Shift, State Looks the Other Way
By Marcela Valente*
BUENOS AIRES - Little does it matter if they’re black or white, rich or poor, young or old. Neither does it matter if they work or hold a degree. In Latin America, women bear the brunt of household chores, child-raising and care of the elderly, while the state looks the other way.
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BRAZIL: Seasonal Widows
By Mario Osava
ARAÇUAÍ, Brazil - Maria Vieira dos Santos has raised her six children practically on her own. For more than a decade, her husband would be away from home nearly eight months out of the year, travelling 1,500 kilometres down south to cut sugarcane in the state of São Paulo.
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LABOUR-URUGUAY: Stitching a Future Together
By Luis Alberto Carro
ROSARIO, Uruguay - The group of women cross this Uruguayan town every morning, some on bike and some on foot, on their way to CODEMUR, a women’s cooperative that resurrected a garment factory abandoned by its owners.
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NICARAGUA: Women Bear the Brunt of the Crisis
By José Adán Silva
MANAGUA - "Don’t worry, your job will be here when you come back," Lorena Castillo’s supervisor reassured her when she asked to take a day off for a gynaecologist appointment. She had been working at the textile factory for the past six months and it was the first time she asked for a day off. It turned out to be her last.
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Labour in RSSWill just any job do when it comes to fighting poverty? Because of the large size of the informal economies in Latin America and the Caribbean, a sizeable proportion of jobs are low-paid and precarious. In some places, basic labour rights are a rarity.
Expanding decent employment, as the International Labour Organisation is pushing for, is a broadly shared aim. But how hard are the countries of the Americas working toward that goal?
"Creating Jobs to Fight Poverty and Strengthen Democratic Governance" is the theme of the Fourth Summit of the Americas, slated for November in Argentina.
Slave and child labour, gender discrimination, local communities and microenterprises working to create quality jobs... in this exclusive coverage, IPS invites you to find out more about the world of labour in the Americas.


News in RSS
AFGHANISTAN: Insurgents Infiltrate Security Forces
LEBANON: Migrant Women Dying on the Job
POLITICS: U.N. in Final Push for 2015 Development Goals
CLIMATE CHANGE: Health at Risk
RIGHTS-MEXICO: State Held Responsible for Three Juárez Killings
POLITICS-BOTSWANA: I Lost the Election, But I Am a Winner
CLIMATE CHANGE: The Danish Example
CHILE: Mapuche Detainees Say They Were Framed
CLIMATE CHANGE-MEXICO: A Policy of Pretence
Q&A: "Karzai Assigned a Rabbit to Take Care of the Carrot"
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Fourth Summit of the Americas
Summits of the Americas Secretariat
International Labour Organisation
Labourers' International Union of North America
International Labour Standards concerning women workers
Child Labour Coalition
AFL-CIO
International Confederation of Free Trade Unions
Global Unions
World Confederation of Labour
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