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11 January, 2019The second meeting of the Asia-Pacific region’s trade unions of Japanese pharmaceuticals multinational, Takeda, met in Tokyo on 15 November 2018. IndustriALL Global Union affiliates from Japan, Indonesia, Korea and the Philippines constituted this meeting of the global network committee.
Takeda union representatives from Europe also joined the meeting as observers.
The Japanese Takeda Pharmaceutical Workers Union (TWU) takes a leading role in coordinating the network, alongside IndustriALL JAF, an affiliate that brings together Japanese unions in the chemical, energy, paper and other sectors. This physical meeting was held at the company’s global headquarters.
As Takeda continues to globalize its business operations, unions are developing an international network structure in order to facilitate information exchange between workers from the different countries.
The meeting assessed other IndustriALL company networks, and the Takeda labour-management relations in each country, under the different national contexts and labour legislation. The meeting’s consensus position was clear that labor-management dialogues must be supported in each country in order to protect every union member’s right, and to maintain and improve working conditions.
TWU President Masato Shinohara, chairing the meeting, stated:
“We will continue to exchange our opinions at the global level through this network system and also work toward a further reinforcement of our global network.”
IndustriALL Assistant General Secretary, Kemal Özkan, stated:
“Unity is our strength. Through building company trade union networks at market-leading multinationals, we combine our efforts to ensure rights and working conditions are improved everywhere. We commend the TWU for its great work to bring us together at Takeda. Our commitment to this work is clear.”