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In this issue the ICEM HIV/AIDS e-bulletin gives information on the procedure leading to the ILO Recommendation on HIV/AIDS and the World of Work. It also takes up the International AIDS Conference, to be held in Mexico City in August.
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The ICEM Calls on its Affiliates to Contribute to this e-bulletin 
 
ICEM affiliates are already engaged in a wide range of HIV/AIDS activities. To spread the information on new agreements, awareness, and prevention campaigns, and educational activities, affiliates and project coordinators are invited to send news and information to hiv.aids@icem.org. Any feedback on the format and contents of the e-bulletin is also welcome.
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ILO Recommendation on HIV/AIDS and the World of Work 
 
In March 2007, the Governing Body of the ILO decided to place on the agenda of the International Labour Conferences for 2009 and 2010 an item intended for “the development of an autonomous Recommendation on HIV and AIDS in the world of work.” 
 
The ILO has begun work towards the adoption of a Recommendation in 2010. Under the Constitution and Standing Orders, five reports have to be prepared within specific time limits, with each report to contain specific information. The first report, called a “Law and Practice Report,” provides an overview of national and international measures taken with respect to HIV/AIDS. This report was published and sent to governments in January 2008. 
 
The Law and Practice Report, which is available at <a href="http://www.ilo.org/aids">www.ilo.org/aids</a>, also contains a questionnaire to which governments, in consultation with employers’ and workers’ organisations, are to provide replies to the ILO by the end of July 2008. Consultation usually occurs through national trade union centres. 
The ICEM calls on its affiliates to get fully involved in this process and make sure that substantive replies, with comments which reflect the views of workers, are provided in time. It is only in this way that the second report, which will be prepared by the ILO on the basis of the replies received, reflects the views of workers and their unions. It is worth noting that workers’ organisations may also provide their comments directly to the ILO. 
(The item above appeared already in the May issue of the e-bulletin. Because of the importance of the campaign, it is repeated here) 

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17th International AIDS Conference in Mexico City, 3 – 8 August 
 
The International AIDS Conference (IAC), organised by the Geneva-based International AIDS Society, takes place every two years. The last one was organised in Toronto in August 2006. The Conference is the largest meeting on HIV/AIDS worldwide. Some 25,000 scientists, politicians and activists are expected to participate in the event. This year’s IAC is first ever held in Latin America. 
 
Conference organisers are developing a wide variety of plenary sessions around the theme, “Universal Action Now.” In addition to these sessions there are satellite meetings, exhibitions, and the Global Village. 
 
It is important that union HIV/AIDS activists participate in this event so that labour’s voice is heard. In Toronto, the labour movement was well represented, highlighting the impact of HIV and AIDS on the workplace and emphasising the role of workers’ organisations in fighting the pandemic. 
 
As in Toronto, the Conference in Mexico will be preceded by a Labour AIDS Forum organised by the Global Union AIDS Programme. The Labour Forum will prepare union representatives for their role in the IAC and will deal with topics such as the challenges at the workplace and raising resources at national level. 
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Botswana Mine Company Launches HIV Survey 
 
The ICEM-affiliated Botswana Mine Workers' Union (BMWU) is involved in an HIV prevalence survey launched by BLC mine to determine whether current prevention efforts are effective. 
 
The exercise will enable the company to have data on the size and distribution of the epidemic among its workforce, and also to help management assess the dynamic and growth of the epidemic since the last survey in 2003. It will also enable BCL to re-plan its interventions, including resource mobilisation for the programmes if the outcome indicates that the current prevention efforts have been ineffective. 
 
The survey of all employees is an anonymous exercise and is not a substitute to voluntary counselling and testing. 
 
(Source: Africa News, 29 May from The Reporter, Botswana) 
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South African Military AIDS Policy Faces Court Challenge 
 
The South African military's blanket exclusions of HIV positive members is not medically justified and ignores government policy. A lawyer for the South African Security Forces Union, which is attempting to force the military to review its HIV/AIDS policy, said the army had failed to implement its own and the government's policies. 
 
"The HIV policy adopted by the cabinet in relation to the military and the Department of Defence is not consistent with the policy implemented by the SANDF (South African National Defence Forces)," lawyer Gilbert Marcus told a hearing at the high court in Pretoria. "The cabinet has adopted a policy that HIV status should not exclude candidates from appointments to the SANDF, although it may preclude their appointment to positions that require extreme physical fitness." 
 
President Thabo Mbeki and Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang are respondents, alongside the military. 
 
According to Marcus, the SANDF has admitted that some 23 percent of its members are HIV positive. "It is simply impossible at this stage to have an HIV-free defence force. The question is how we accommodate this." 
 
(Source: Pretoria News, 15 May) 
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PEPFAR Re-authorisation 
 
Treatment clients from free clinics run by the AIDS Healthcare Foundation in South Africa, Botswana, and Rwanda lobbied US legislators to ensure that access to lifesaving antiretroviral treatment remains a key component of PEPFAR. 
 
The PEPFAR legislation, which is up for re-authorisation by the US Congress, currently requires that a minimum of 55% of funds be spent on treatment, a provision that has been completely removed from the re-authorisation bill. The group also calls for a significant increase in PEPFAR's treatment goals – up only 50% in the re-authorisation despite a 330% increase in overall PEPFAR funding. 
 
PEPFAR was the result of the 2003 State of the Union pledge to bring two million HIV positive Africans and others into treatment and prevent seven million new HIV infections via a five-year, $15 billion US-funded program. It currently operates in 15 focus countries and claims to support antiretroviral treatment for 1.4 million people worldwide. 
 
(Source: Africa News, 10 May) 
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The World Bank’s Commitment to Fight HIV/AIDS 
 
A World Bank report says African countries must continue to champion HIV prevention efforts to slow and reverse the rate of new infections. According to the report “The World Bank’s Commitment to HIV/AIDS in Africa: Our Agenda for Action, 2007-2011,” for every infected person starting antiretroviral treatment, another four to six become newly infected, even as regional figures show falling prevalence in some countries. 
 
“With AIDS the largest single cause of premature death in Africa, we can’t talk about better, lasting development there without also committing to stay the course in the long-term fight against the disease,” said Elizabeth Lule, Manager of the Bank’s AIDS Team for Africa (ACTafrica). 
 
With this new Agenda for Action, the Bank is moving away from its initial “emergency response.” It would commit at least US$250 million a year over the five-year period for HIV/AIDS initiatives built on strategic objectives. It will also establish a grant incentive fund of US$5 million annually to promote capacity building, analysis, and HIV/AIDS project components in key sectors. 
 
(Source: World Bank Press Release, 14 May) 
 
Comment by the editor of the e-bulletin: 
While this long-term commitment is laudable, it is surprising that after the Global Union/World Bank consultations on HIV/AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa in Washington in December 2007, workers’ organisations or trade unions are not even mentioned among the organisations which were consulted in devising this new strategy. It is also surprising that the World Bank stresses the importance of providing people with integrated health services when its policies over years have helped to dismantle public health systems. 
 
Following the consultations last December, the ICEM is pursuing a selective approach, in the sectors it represents, to get its affiliates involved in projects financed by the World Bank and the International Finance Corporation. The objective is to devise effective workplace activities and capacity building for unions. 
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ILO Says Caribbean Making Progress on AIDS in Workplace 
 
The "Saving Lives, Protecting jobs" report (see e-bulletin no. 32, May 2008) indicates that 70 enterprises in Barbados, Belize, Guyana, Jamaica, and Trinidad and Tobago have implemented policies and HIV/AIDS education programmes to promote responsible sexual behaviour, and reduce the level of discrimination faced by people living with the disease. 
 
The report shows a 34% increase in awareness about HIV/AIDS services on the job among workers in the tourism, manufacturing, banking, and finance sectors, as well as taxi drivers. Guyana's largest employer, the Guyana Sugar Company, has been lauded for sustaining the initiatives it implemented five years ago.
It has adopted an HIV/AIDS workplace policy and offers HIV services to workers and managers. An official of the Guyana Trade Union Congress said that 78% of partnering enterprises in Guyana have allocated official working hours to HIV/AIDS education during the last six months. 
 
Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago were also praised for their efforts to target members of the informal economy. The governments of both countries have adopted national policies on HIV/AIDS and recently Trinidad and Tobago took it a step further by launching a National Workplace Policy on HIV/AIDS. 
 
The ILO report, however, pointed out that despite the progress being made in some countries, the region continues to grapple with rising levels of infection, even as treatment reaches more people. The Caribbean has the second highest rate of HIV/AIDS prevalence in the world, after Sub-Saharan Africa. 
 
(Source: Caribbean Media Corporation website, Bridgetown, 21 May) 
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Commentary: Dropping the Ball 
(The following is an abbreviated version of an article which appeared in the Global Fund Observer No. 87, 17 April 2008. It was written by Wycliffe Muga, a Kenyan journalist who is the BBC World Service’s “Letter from Africa” correspondent) 
 
If you stopped an ordinary man in the street here in Kenya and told him that there is a Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria which gives money to help Kenya fight the three diseases, he would probably be pleasantly surprised. For not many people here have any idea that such a fund exists. 
 
And if you then told him that at present, Kenya is only receiving about half of the money it could receive from this fund – not because the money is being diverted to private bank accounts, but because the people charged with preparing proposals and submitting them to the Fund have been unable to come up with proposals which are acceptable – the likely response would be one of outrage. 
 
In a country where far too many people die of the diseases which this money is intended to fight, anything less than a perfect proposal prepared well in advance would seem like criminal negligence. 
 
For each of Rounds 1 through 6, the Global Fund's announcing of its “Call for Proposals” led to a flurry of activity in most developing countries: CCMs met, task teams were put together and consultants were sought. As the deadline for proposal submission got closer, people got more and more frantic. 
It was largely because of this “controlled chaos” that the Fund agreed two years ago that the Call for Proposals will always be on March 1. Thus, people know months beforehand when the Call will be issued. The idea is to enable CCMs to spend those extra months planning what their forthcoming proposals will focus on and seeking technical support. 
 
So it came as a real surprise when one month AFTER this year's Call for Proposals, rather than two months BEFORE it, UNAIDS headquarters sent out an email to UNAIDS offices around the world, instructing them to take action supporting CCMs as they prepare their proposals and seek technical support. 
 
This was not some unexpected deadline which was arbitrarily imposed on the CCMs. It is a deadline that comes around every year, on a date that is known well in advance. How can it possibly be justified that this great effort is being made this late in the day? 
 
Everybody dropped the ball here – the civil society groups that pressured UNAIDS to take action, but didn't do so until well after the Call for Proposals; UNAIDS itself, for not getting moving on this until it was pushed by the civil society groups; and those many CCMs that delayed strategizing regarding their Global Fund applications until months later than they should. 
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News from the Global Union Programme and Global Unions 
 
The Global Union AIDS Programme is organising an HIV/AIDS African Regional Consultative and Planning Forum in Johannesburg, South Africa, on 12-13 June. The ICEM will be represented by Project Management Assistant Paula Ndessomin. 
 
In its most recent HIV/AIDS Update (No. 42 of 1 May 2008), the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) (<a href="http://www.itfglobal.org">www.itfglobal.org</a>) gives a detailed analysis on travel restrictions against people living with HIV. The creation of an International Task Team is a critical opportunity to move towards the elimination of all travel restrictions against HIV-positive people.

ICEM HIV/AIDS e-bulletin

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A 14-day tyre strike by 4,000 members of ICEM affiliate Lastik-İş in Turkey ended Friday night, 13 June, and workers at three multinational rubber companies were back on their jobs for the afternoon shift on 14 June. 
 
The strike ended when a two-year accord was reached between the union and the three employers, who jointly represent the tyre industry in talks. The companies include Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., Bridgestone Brisa Sabanci, and Pirelli.
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The 13 June bargaining was the first set of negotiations since the strike began on 31 May. Talks first began on a renewal labour agreement for 2008-2009 at the four tyre factories in September 2007. 
 
The two sides agreed to a 14% pay increase for the year 2008, and an increase equaling the Turkish rate of inflation for 2009. In 2007, the Turkish rate of inflation was 8.39% and is expected to rise above that this year. Lastik-İş had sought a 12% wage hike for the first six months of 2008, with increases matching the inflation rate in each six-month period through 2009. 
 
All levels of social benefits will also increase by the inflation rate over the life of the labour agreement. The ICEM considers the 2008-2009 Turkish rubber agreement a major achievement, considering wage and social benefit gains were stymied in the late 1990s and early years of this decade due to strike bans imposed by the Turkish government.
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Lastik-İş President Abdullah Karacan
“We didn’t make any concessions, we preserved our contractual and work-rule provisions, and we posted substantial economic gains,” stated Lastik-İş President Abdullah Karacan. “The decisiveness of our union members at these four factories was effective and ultimately proved successful in bargaining.” 
 
The four tyre plants, which saw workers return to work at 16h00 on 14 June, include: two of US-based Goodyear in Izmit and Adapazari, and one each operated by Bridgestone Brisa Sabanci, a joint venture between Japan-based Bridgestone and the Turkish Sabanci Group, and by Italian-based Pirelli. Both of the latter two are located in the city of Izmit.

Turkey’s 14-Day Rubber Strike Ends with 14% First year Wage Gain

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The aftermath of the early morning, 8 June, coal mine explosion inside the Karl Marx Mine near Yenakiyevo in the Ukraine is remarkable in that only 12 miners perished. The blast was so powerful that it ripped cable couplings on an elevator shaft to metal shreds, causing sparks, thus enhancing the explosion. 
 
The elevator, with nine miners aboard, plummeted down a mine shaft. Those nine and another three miners, who were buried by debris, died. Twenty-four miners were rescued some 36 hours after the explosion. The explosion was so potent that it injured five workers on the surface. 
 
The mine, owned by the state company Ordzhonikidzevuhillia, is a small producer of anthracite coal, with production of only 250 tonnes per day. It is also a high-cost operation. Had the mine been a major producer, meaning hundreds more miners would have been at work, the death toll would have been much higher.
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The government’s State Committee of Health and Safety at Work, as well as a Mining Oversight Committee, has put the blame on management. They said mining at this colliery, 40 kilometres east of the regional capital of Donetsk, had been banned two days earlier due to high methane levels. 
 
In fact, according to ICEM affiliate Coal Mining Workers’ Union of Ukraine (PRUPU), production had officially stopped, but a skip hoist was in use at the time of the explosion, lifting some 700 tonnes of coal to the surface. The coal had already been mined and was in storage at one of the colliery’s levels. 
 
Regarding overall safety, the Karl Marx Mine should not have been in operation. But it should be noted that there are few employment opportunities in this area of the central Donbass region, and coal mining provides livelihoods for thousands of families. The 8 June explosion at Yenakiyevo cries out for state-of-the-art mining technology, enhanced safety methods, as well as other, sustainable forms of employment for the region’s citizens. 
 
Early Saturday, 14 June, in the community of Gorlovka, Ukraine, just 20 kilometres from Yenakiyevo, 15 miners were hospitalized with sulfur poisoning. The accident occurred when a sulfuric acid cloud was released from a chemical operation adjacent to a coal mine. The factory is owned by JSC Concern Stirol, a make of chemicals and fertilizers. The incident happened when the chemicals producer was re-start of a sulfuric acid plant.

12 Dead, 24 Rescued in Last Week’s Coal Mine Explosion in Eastern Ukraine

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 The European Mine, Chemical, Energy Federation (EMCEF) conducted its Fourth Congress 11-13 June in Prague, Czech Republic. The Congress was attended by over 300 delegates from 29 countries, with participants re-electing President Hubertus Schmoldt and Reinhard Reibsch as General Secretary. 

Schmoldt is the President of ICEM and EMCEF affiliate IGBCE of Germany. Reibsch has served as head of the European federation since the year 2000.
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In his keynote speech, Schmoldt stressed that the interests of European workers cannot fall victim to unbridled market forces. “We must ensure that European trade unions move a social dimension to the center of all European policy,” he said. 

Schmoldt also emphasized the need for close cooperation and collaboration between European trade union federations in the chemicals, energy, mining, metals, leathers, and textile sectors. EMCEF’s General Assembly adopted such a resolution in 2006 in Istanbul, Turkey. 

The Congress heard thorough reports on the Secretariat, as well from EMCEF’s four standing committees – Collective Bargaining, Works Councils, Industrial Relations (including environment, health and safety), and Social Dialogue. 
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Main speakers included John Monks, Secretary General for the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC), and Manfred Warda, General Secretary of ICEM, who attended the EMCEF Congress with ICEM President Senzeni Zokwana.
Warda credited the many European trade unions, which play such vital roles in creating global solidarity with ICEM affiliates worldwide. “For us in ICEM, the link with EMCEF is of the highest value and of top priority,” said Warda. “A united, strong and successful EMCEF is an essential base for all that ICEM does.” 

The 2.5-million-member EMCEF was created in 1996 with the merger of separate chemicals and mining federations. The federation now has 128 affiliated unions in 35 countries.

EMCEF Congress Concludes in Prague with Re-election of Schmoldt and Reibsch

The ICEM Women’s Committee adopted a strong action plan on Zimbabwe 19 June, at its annual Women’s Committee meetings, which followed the Global Union Federation’s Executive Committee in Geneva, Switzerland. The action plan, prepared by Angeline Chitambo, an ICEM Vice President, who is President of the Zimbabwe Electricity and Energy Workers’ Union (ZEEWU), presents a six-point plan in which ICEM affiliates can lend assistance to what has become a deteriorating political situation.
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 ICEM Women's Leaders and Vice Presidents, Evgenia Esenina and Angeline Chtambo 
 

In a statement presenting the plan, the Women’s Committee said: “Though the situation has always been bad in Zimbabwe, we have seen the worst after the 29th March 2008 elections … the violence that was released by the government, mainly in rural areas, affected women mostly, as the bulk of women stay in the rural areas where they work on the land for survival.” 
 
The statement says that many women give in to pressure, and become prostitutes in order to make ends meet. The result is the increasing spread of HIV/AIDS. 
 
The statement adds: “Those who are affected by HIV/AIDS are more vulnerable. Imagine you are the mother, your child dies of AIDS and after all that you have gone through, you cannot bury your child in time because there is no fuel, or the gravediggers are on strike because the city council cannot pay their salaries.” 
 
The statement reports that women in Zimbabwe are prepared to go to the offices of the ruling ZANU PF political offices on 27 June to stand up to their repressive and violent measures, and demand the reconstruction of their country.
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The ICEM Women’s Committee is calling on affiliated trade unions to: 
 
Understand what is occurring in Zimbabwe and how it affects workers and the poor; Send a team to get a full understand of the Zimbabwean situation; Mobilise basic food supplies to assist affiliated trade unions inside Zimbabwe; Task neighbouring trade unions in respective countries to assist; Press Zimbabwean embassies in home countries on the situation, and get NGOs and other Global Union Federations to assist; and pressure Zimbabwe’s government to make food commodities available and affordable.
The ICEM will issue a Circular related to the Women's Committee action in the enar future.

ICEM Women’s Committee Adopts Action Plan on Zimbabwe

1. ICEM Women’s Committee Holds Meeting in Geneva 
 
ICEM Women’s Committee met on 19 June 2008, in Geneva, and appealed to the federation’s leadership to return to the usual practice of holding the committee meetings prior to Presidium and Executive Committee meetings. Since it was the first meeting of the Congress period, the women introduced themselves at length. Some of the highlights from the introductions were the following: given that there are not many women leaders in Japanese trade unions, there is a desire to train women leaders there. In Thailand, unions have been mobilizing in recent months against the high food prices. Four men were present at the meeting. 
 
Sister Hashmeya Muhssin, President of the Iraqi General Union of Electricity Workers’ and Technicians, reported on the situation in Iraq. Iraq not only suffers from the occupation of foreign forces, but also from intervention from neighboring countries. Things are getting worse. Many armaments are entering the country. Most services are blocked – there is no electricity, no drains, and no petrol, mainly due to the lack of security. Women have been killed. 
 
The police claim that they are killed because they are not dressed properly. Women have crimes committee against them. Women sit home, unemployed, because of the dangerous security situation. The situation for women has regressed. They must shake themselves and rise up. Women in unions are trying to develop a women’s role, often together with NGOs. Despite the difficulties, some women are active. Nevertheless, the lack of security and isolation means that not all women can be reached. The women in the dockworkers’ union and the oil workers’ unions need support. 
 
Women once played a key role in the economy. When men went off to war, the women managed the economy. At one point, 75% of the workforce was women. Women make up 65% of the population in Iraq. Bur unemployment among women is about 60%. There are many women workers, but few women are in trade unions. Unions are prohibited from existing in the public sector. 
 
Trade unions are starting out new, so people have no experience. Young people are working as volunteers. People make mistakes but they are willing to learn. Three women organized a conference, which was covered by the press, to fight against Decree 150, the Saddam-era decree prohibiting unions in the public sector. The Iraqi government implements laws that are imposed by other countries. 
 
Angeline Chitambo, President of Zimbabwe Electricity Workers’ Union and a Vice President of the ICEM, reported on the crisis in Zimbabwe. Women make up 52% of the population. Women are especially faced with food shortages. Most of the people in rural areas are women, because that is where food sources are supposed to be. But violence has been unleashed in the rural areas, and women have been tortured. Food supplies are now scarce. Farms do not produce enough. 
 
There is a shortage of transport; transport to hospitals, due to the fuel shortage, is non-existent. HIV/AIDS drugs are unavailable. Women resort to prostitution to make ends meet. There is no sanitary protection available to women in general, and only those with money have access to it. 
 
The government uses thugs, and everything functions on the basis of bribes. Women used to support the government, but now they want change. Women’s organizations and coalitions are organizing to mobilise women to vote. Recommendations were made to ICEM for practical support. ICEM published an Action Alert on the Zimbabwe situation on 20 June, and the points contained were sent out in an ICEM Circular. 
 
A brief report was given on the situation of women in Colombia on the basis of the visit to Colombia by ICEM leadership in March 2008. A peace march was attended on 6 March. On 8 March, ICEM Colombia held a seminar to commemorate International Women’s Day. Colombian women examined their history and reflected on how their lives were different from their mothers’ and grandmothers’ lives. An NGO of women was visited and the issue of armed conflict was discussed. Special consideration must be given to women in indigenous communities and how they are affected by the oil industry. El Cerrejón mine provides treatment for HIV/AIDS to indigenous communities near the mine in a model project. 
 
Special thought has to be given to the issue of women, and the effect that armed conflict has on women, both as victims and perpetrators, women as guerrillas or ex-guerrillas. Terrorism means a new challenge. 
 
In connection with the discussion on the seven points from the 19 June ICEM Women’s Conference, Baru Khumo, General Secretary of the Botswana Diamond Sorters and Valuators’ Union, reported on the ICEM Sub-Saharan Africa Region’s Women’s Committee meeting, held in Accra, Ghana, in early June 2008. The meeting covered the seven points adopted by the ICEM Women’s Conference of 2007. The three axes of the meeting were Decent Work, gender justice, and HIV/AIDS. 
 
In France, the CFDT has been talking about equality for decades, but inequality persists. A new law determines that equal pay has to exist by 1 January 2010. Negotiations are required. The chemical industry had a recent agreement. There is a legal requirement to have delegations made up of women and men in negotiations to reflect women’s real representation in the sector. This would mean 35 to 40% women in delegations. One proposal is to include clauses in Global Framework Agreements to respect equality between women and men. 
 
In Denmark, there is a slight move away from pure equal pay and toward evaluating and appreciating job categories. 
 
A brief report was provided on EMCEF, where the main challenge is to find out why women do not attend meetings. 
 
As far as the point on peace is concerned, in the Asia-Pacific Region, an environment must be created for women to work in peaceful conditions, particularly in Myanmar and Nepal. 
 
In Costa Rica, a women’s trade union agenda was drafted with the support of FES. The six axes coincide to a great extent with ICEM’s points. Serious problems exist at a refinery due to a crisis situation, which means that gender work has stalled. Nevertheless women are now participating in spaces that before were open only to men. 
 
In Spain, work is proceeding on implementing the equality law. Agreements exist with Michelin and Bridgestone as well as St Gobain and BASF. The law is valid for companies with more than 250 employees. A project to combat violence is soon to be launched together with the Nordic and Baltic countries. 
 
The ICEM’s seven points should form part of the Worldwide Day on Decent Work on 7 October. 
 
One further point for debate was gender and sustainable development. The paper provided by ICEM should be amended to form part of a larger study. Gender equality is part and parcel of sustainable development. 
 
Items such as women as consumers and users of energy in the home, the food crisis, biofuels, escalating oil prices, and living wage must be added. Women need to be empowered in order to achieve sustainable development. 
 
Work will continue on Decent Work, sustainable development and the seven points. ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda suggested that the seven points and their implementation should be on the agenda of the ICEM Executive Committee in 2009.
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2. ICEM Sub-Sahara Africa Regional Women Meet 
 
The ICEM’s Sub-Sahara Africa Region Women’s Committee met from 5 to 7 June in Accra, Ghana, to draft a women’s charter for Africa. Women from Ghana, Botswana, Nigeria, Zambia, Cote d’Ivoire, South Africa, Tanzania, DRC, Zimbabwe, and Guinea attended the meeting. After a brainstorming session, in which women identified all of their objectives, three focuses were identified: Decent Work, gender justice, and HIV/AIDS. These were seen to cover all of the needs that had been expressed. The objectives were matched with target groups and time frames. 
 
Decent Work covers equal pay for equal work, discrimination in recruitment, and maternity protection, as well as women in the informal economy among other things. Gender justice refers to women’s structures, work-life balance, gender-sensitive policies, sexual harassment, and violence. Particular points that were discussed related to HIV/AIDS were the cultural values such as polygamy and female genital mutilation which present particular challenges for the spread of HIV. 
 
The solution to all of the above-mentioned issues is women’s empowerment. If gender equality is more of a focus in the labour movement, then women’s interests will be promoted. One other solution is integrating gender into the mainstream. Gender and cultural dynamics must be scrutinized. 
 
The women’s structure will monitor and evaluate the achievements and weaknesses.
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3. ICEM Nepal Works on Women’s Health and Maternity Care 
 
A session on women’s health and maternity care was organized by ICEM Nepal on 20 to 22 May, in Kathmandu. Dr Sarita Pandey started the program with the question, “What is women’s health?” The distinction was made between health and reproductive health. Adolescent health was one focus with the effects detailed of psychological and physical changes. Apshara Pandey explained the different methods of family planning with the benefits and drawbacks of each. Information was given on pregnancy and abortion as well as laws regarding abortion. The use of different types of contraceptives was explained. 
 
Pemba Lama presented maternity health and maternity care. Prenatal and postnatal care was the focus. The pros and cons of the different types of contraceptives were explained such as norplant, condoms, and copper T. Beli Maya Ghale presented the symptoms and consequences of uterus prolapse as well as the methods to control it. In addition, Janak Chaudhary presented the laws the government has passed for women. All sessions were very interactive.
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4. UN Calls for Greater Efforts to End Sexual Violence in Conflict 
 
On 19 June 2008, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon led a session calling for an end to the scourge of violence against women in conflict areas. A task force will be set up in an effort called the UN Action against Sexual Violence in Conflict. It will involve various issues, including peacekeeping, HIV/AIDS, and human rights to help stop rape and other sexual crimes in conflict-ridden countries. He also called for more involvement of women in conflict prevention, peace negotiations and recovery efforts. 
 
In addition, women’s representatives from different organizations in Africa also met from 16 to 18 June in Nairobi at the FAO Africa conference, where they made a statement on the food crisis. It was felt that improved women’s access, control and ownership of land and natural and productive resources would help eradicate hunger and poverty.
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5. United Kingdom:  Government Hosts Conference for Trade Union Equality Representatives 
 
The UK Government organized a conference on trade union equality representatives on 24 June. Equality reps are supposed to inform people of their rights at work and, hence, achieve fairness on the job. 
 
Up to now, the government has been funding projects to promote equality reps. Equality reps can assist people facing discrimination and support them in many issues, such as flexible work for parents and those caring for the elderly, disability, age, equal pay, and harassment. They can also negotiate with the employer to assure a fair deal at work and support disabled people to keep them on the job. 
 
Equality reps can raise awareness about rights and keep people at work who otherwise would tend to stop work to care for older or disabled relatives. Child poverty can be combated by negotiating deals for single parents to keep them at work as well. 
 
Equality reps can do the following: promote equality and diversity issues, help employers engage with employees, help carry out equal pay audits, be involved in devising a full range of equality policies, help create a more equitable work-life balance to help workers combine their domestic and work responsibilities, ensure that part-time and other atypical workers receive fair treatment, help employers develop positive action schemes, and help perform access assessments for disabled persons.
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6. United States/Mexico: Women of Steel Express their Solidarity with Mexican Workers 
 
A delegation of 14 women from the United Steelworkers went to the Cananea mine in Sonora, Mexico, to express their solidarity with miners and their families. They have been on strike since 31 July 2007. Most of the women in the delegation were of Hispanic origin. They came from the Southwest of the United States and from California. Their aim was to get the employer and the government to stop the repression against the mineworkers’ union. They got to know the history of the strike, and saw first hand the conditions that miners’ families live in.
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7. Western Sahara: National Union of Sahrawi Women Appeals for Support 
 
The Sahrawi women’s union was created in 1974 to support the fight for independence and self-determination. The women suffer from the hard desert life, a lack of the minimum needs for subsistence, isolation, the absence of men so that they have to assume family burdens, a low level of education, lack of knowledge of how to care for those suffering from war. 
 
The women try to create awareness at national level about women’s position and their role in national independence. They try to make women realize the importance of participating. The women would like to contribute to education on the basis of equality for girls and boys at school. Preventive health care is one more area in which women develop consciousness. 
 
The organisation has close relations with women’s organisations in Africa and the Arab world, as well as organizations that work for peace. The women appeal for moral and political support for the Sahrawi people in its fight for self-determination and independence.

ICEM Women's Bulletin: June 2008

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ICEM Peruvian mining affiliate, Federación Nacional de Trabajadores Mineros Metalúrgicos y Siderúrgicos (FNTMMSP), began a national strike today over the National Assembly’s inactivity on two key pieces of labour legislation. 
 
Despite President Alan García signing into law on 24 June a measure which gives new rights to contract workers, legislation remains stalled on raising the national threshold for profit-sharing plans and on improvements to pension schemes.
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The union had twice previously – in May and again on 16 June – postponed strike actions by its 28,000 members in hopes that the government would act on all three issues to avert a national mining strike. The indefinite strike began at midnight today by several of FNTMMSP’s 70 branch unions, and is expected to spread over the next few days. 
 
“There is a total lack of political will by the government to solve the demands of miners,” said FNTMMSP Secretary-General Luis Castillo Carlos late last week. “Many miners Exist on starvation wages, they do not have access to health benefits, nor do they have the right to retirement benefits for their service work.” 
 
On 28 May, the National Assembly passed an outsourcing law that affects 85,000 contract workers in the mining sector. García had 30 days to sign it into law and did so three days before it was to expire. The law places stricter regulations on contract employers, including adherence to the nation’s labour code. It also grants contract workers the right to grieve adverse work conditions to the primary employer, and sets up an agency to monitor such abuses. Employers with contract workers can now face first-time sanctions. 
 
The FNTMMSP had been the driving force inside Peru for the law, which was ardently opposed by business groups on the basis on restricting labour market flexibility.
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Today’s strike is expected to hit Peru’s copper, gold, silver, zinc, and iron ore production, as well as send prices upward on world markets for those commodities. The strike will also again close Grupo México’s Southern Copper mining and smelting operations in Peru’s southern Moquegua province. 
 
Southern Copper was closed for ten days in mid-June as roads were blocked in a regional dispute with the central government over tax revenue sharing. That dispute saw mayors of several towns in the south embarking on hunger strikes in Lima.
  
And Peru’s largest national labour centre, the General Confederation of Peruvian Workers (CGTP), has called a strike of its member unions on 9 July over rising food and energy prices, as well as on the legislative inertia over the profit-sharing and pension issues.

Mining Strike Begins in Peru over Government Inaction on Pension, Profit-Sharing Issues

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ICEM affiliate Construction, Forestry, Mining, and Energy Union (CFMEU) of Australia is demanding that the federal government stick to pledges made by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd on renewable energy targets last year during his Labour Party campaign. 
 
The demand comes as Federal Treasury and Productivity Commission officials move to sideline the government’s promise to supply 20% of the country’s energy from renewable sources by the year 2020 in favour of emissions trading schemes. 
 
In a letter to Sen. Penny Wong, the Labour Government’s Minister for Climate Change and Water, CFMEU Mining and Energy President Tony Maher urged the government to implement policies that will stimulate low-emission energy technologies. And to do that, the CFMEU believes, is not to abandon the Minimum Renewable Energy Target.
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CFMEU's Tony Maher
“What the Australian government does with its renewable energy target policy will affect the future resilience of the Australian economy in a low carbon future,” wrote Maher. “If we remove the renewable target, it will result in a substitution of gas for wind power and other forms of renewable energy. While that will result in a lowering of our average emissions, it does not help to prepare the economy and the energy supply industry for the medium to long term. 
 
“The current 20% by 2020 policy needs to be further defined to ensure that the emerging technologies of geo-thermal and solar thermal are strategically cultivated, rather than placing all eggs in the basket of wind power.” 
 
The CFMEU is seeking a government commitment to get at least three power plants that operate with carbon capture and storage methods by 2020. The costs of such start-ups might be high, but in the long term, as more such plants come on line and other renewable sources take hold, costs will decrease.
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The CFMEU is in alliance with the Australian Coal Association, the WWF, and the Climate Institute in urging the government to stimulate investment for operable carbon capture and storage plants. CFMEU is certain that charges related to emissions trading schemes will not come close to equalling the investment needed for the new technologies related to carbon capture. It is that fear, and others, which threaten the reaching of Minimum Renewable Energy Targets. 
 
CFMEU also believes reliance on emissions trading schemes, followed by an inevitable “dash for gas,” will mean gas-fired generation will eventually have to be fitted with carbon capture and storage technologies. 
 
As Maher concluded in his letter to Climate Change Minister Wong, “We would be off to a bad start if the economic rationalists that have so long delayed action on climate change had their way and swept aside a good Labour Government policy on renewable energy.”

CFMEU Presses Australian Government to Stick to Renewable Energy Targets

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Australia will be left with only one tyre manufacturing plant at the close of 2008, following Goodyear Tire and Rubber Co.’s decision to close its wholly-owned subsidiary, South Pacific Tyres. The company announced on 26 June that 600 rubber workers will lose their jobs when its Somerton car and light truck tyre operation shuts in the northern suburbs of Melbourne, Victoria. 
 
The decision is blamed on imports, the high value of the Australian dollar, and supplier contracts that allow manufacturers the option to demand lower prices during the life of a supply contract. Australia’s National Union of Workers (NUW), the union representing the majority of Somerton’s workers, said the closure could cause a ripple effect costing 2,000 other jobs in some 130 other supplying companies. 
 
The NUW blamed South Pacific for closing a heavy truck tyre plant in Australia in the year 2000. The union said the company missed out on the opportunity to capitalise on the current mining boom, with manufacture of heavy tyres for trucks and equipment servicing that sector.
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“They showed a lack of foresight then, and are lacking foresight now by acting ahead of a refocusing of Australian automotive that should deliver a sustainable future for local industry based on production of more efficient and greener vehicles,” said Antony Thow, NUW’s Victoria Secretary. 

Australia is currently undergoing a review of the automotive sector by former Victoria Premier Steve Bracks. His commission is aimed at revamping the country’s Automotive Competitiveness and Investment Scheme, as well as a green car fund proposed by the Kevin Rudd government. The Bracks Commission is examining whether to retain the 10% tariff on imports beyond 2010, or half it to 5%, as recommended by the Productivity Commission. 

The Somerton plant produces Dunlop, Goodyear, and Olympic tyres, and supplies 100% of Ford’s new car tyres, as well as a product to Toyota. It also sells to major retail outlets in the after-market. The plant opened in 1961 and currently produces 10,000 units per day. 

Goodyear took a 50% stake in South Pacific with Pacific Dunlop in 1987. The American company retained that stake when Ansell Ltd. bought Pacific Dunlop’s assets. And then in January 2006, Goodyear bought Ansell’s 50% stake for US$90.3 million.
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In first quarter 2007, Goodyear shuttered a South Pacific tyre plant near Wellington, New Zealand, costing 430 unionised workers their jobs. The Somerton closing, in which workers are expected to receive up to 18 months in severance payments through their enterprise labour agreement, is part of a Goodyear restructuring to achieve US$150 million in costs savings by reducing tyre production by 25 million units per day. Somerton accounts for three million annual units, and Goodyear will realise a US$35 million in costs savings. 

Following 31 December 2008, Australia’s lone remaining tyre production facility will be the Bridgestone Salisbury plant near Adelaide, South Australia.

Goodyear to Close South Pacific Tyre Plant in Australia at End of 2008

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The seven unions representing more than 3,000 workers at a Michelin tyre plant in the northern Spanish province of Alava have united behind a comrade stricken with Mesothelioma. The unions last week sent a petition to both the company and to the regional Institute of Work Security to trace the presence of asbestos in the 42-year history of the plant. 
 
The Michelin plant is in the city of Vitoria and manufactures 36,000 units per day of car and heavy equipment tyres. In early June, the regional health and safety authority reopened an investigation after a worker employed by Michelin for 30 years was diagnosed with the cancer caused by asbestos exposure.
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Workplace representatives of ICEM affiliates CCOO and UGT were joined by five other unions in the call to clarify the causes of the illness. Michelin denies that it currently uses or has any form of asbestos in the plant, but the company did import the product in years past to insulate the factory’s heating pipes. 
 
The Vitoria workers, through their union representatives, sent a pledge of solidarity to the stricken worker, as well as committed to conduct voluntary tests of other workers and to assist in the investigation in any way possible.

Unions Mount Pressure on Cause of Asbestos inside Spanish Michelin Plant

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