An international IUF fact-finding team has been denied access to an Assam plantation to investigate the recent deaths of three workers. The plantation is owned by Amalgamated Plantations in which Tata Global Beverages is the major shareholder. The 930 hectare Powai estate has one of the world’s largest tea-processing factories and employs some 1,800 permanent [...]

 A group of migrant workers in Hong Kong, including Filipinos, lambasted the Legislative Council’s (LegCo) final vote against the inclusion of foreign domestic workers (FDWs) in the statutory minimum wage. “Slavery, marginalization and discrimination have now been put into law in HK. There is neither justice nor democracy in the Legislative Council’s (LegCo) vote against [...]

For Immediate release. 10 June 2010 Indonesia must enact Domestic Workers Protection Law now Committee for Asian Women calls on the Indonesian parliament to prioritise the deliberation and enactment of the Domestic Workers Protection Bill of 2010, submitted to the House of Representatives in 2009 for the purpose of recognising legal rights of domestic workers [...]

Women drivers got an insight into labour issues and raised key concerns at an education programme in Kathmandu, Nepal recently. The programme, organised by the women’s department of the ITF-affiliated union Nepal Yatayat Mazdoor Sangh, known as NETWON, involved around 20 women drivers of three-wheelers, known as tempo vehicles. During the sessions on 26 and [...]

Workers from a West Bengal tea plantation who participated in a protest last year against the abusive treatment of a pregnant 22 year-old tea garden worker could face prison sentences of up to 7 years, if India’s powerful Tata Group has its way. Mrs. Arti Oraon, tea plucker who collapsed after being forced to work [...]

The abuse of domestic workers, the majority of whom are women, is still widespread in South Africa despite calls for the government to intensify the implementation of the domestic workers law. The Sectoral Determination 7: Domestic Worker Sector law, which was promulgated in 2002, set minimum wages and conditions such as working hours, leave days [...]

Karmojibi Nari, a women’s rights organisation and one of CAW’s member groups in Bangladesh, yesterday demanded that the government formulate a law on agricultural labour immediately to ensure the rights of women workers in this sector. Addressing a rally at Muktangon in the city, the leaders of the organisation also called for declaring Tk 5,000 as [...]

The wage gap between South Korean male and female workers is the highest among key industrialized economies, a report by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) showed on 2nd April. The report released to mark this year’s International Women’s Day revealed that of the 21 OECD countries checked, South Korea had the widest [...]

Jakarta – Not all domestic workers in Indonesia are as lucky as Inem, Indonesia’s favorite maid in Nya Abbas Akub’s 1976 blockbuster comedy Inem Pelayan Seksi (Inem, the sexy maid), who ended up marrying her employer’s boss and living happily ever after. In fact, Inem did much to romanticize the life of domestic workers, just [...]

JEDDAH: There is a move on the part of Saudi authorities to stop housemaids coming from certain countries. “We are serious in imposing a ban on the import of housemaids from Sri Lanka, Nepal, Cambodia and Vietnam,” said Ali Al-Quraishi, vice president of the local Labor Recruitment Committee. “The main reason for considering such a [...]