ILO calls for provision of skills and lifelong learning for workers in the informal economy to promote Decent Work
Closing the skills gap in the informal economy is essential for reducing work deficits and strengthening the ability of individuals, and enterprises to move into the formal economy, delegates at the BRICS Meeting were told on Tuesday.
Ms Claire Harasty, Senior Advisor to the Assistant Director-General ILO (International Labour Organisation), was speaking in Port Alfred, Eastern Cape, at the BRICS Employment Working Group Meeting attended by representatives from Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
According to her, in 2019, there were 900 million workers in informal work in BRICS countries, which is 45 percent of the two billion workers in informal jobs worldwide.
Ms Harasty said the livelihood of being in informal employment decreases with high levels of educational achievement.
“In BRICS countries, more than nine in 10 persons with no education work in the informal economy. In contrast, only one in four people with tertiary education end up in informal employment.”
She said overall, around 62 percent of workers are in informal employment in BRICS countries.
“Informal employment ranges from 21 percent in the Russian Federation to around 40 percent in Brazil and South Africa, just above 50 percent in China and nearly 90 percent in India,” she said.
Ms Harasty said formalisation was a means to achieve greater access to Decent Work, reduce poverty, increase equality and productivity and advance social justice.
She said skills and lifelong learning play an important role to create incentives for individuals and enterprises to transition formality by increasing the capacity and productivity, but also by reducing the vulnerability and addressing decent work deficits.
Turning to skills acquisition in the informal economy, she said: “This likely occurs through informal on the job training. This training can be unstructured and occur through the form of a worker learning by doing or through informal learning from friends, family or community members.
She said the way forward includes recognition or prior learning which allows government and other stakeholders to support informal economy workers in providing the skills that they have developed through apprenticeships, on the job training and non-formal learning.
She said closing the skills gap in the informal economy and strengthening the employability of individuals and ability of enterprises to enter into the formal economy was a means to archive decent work.
Ms Harasty said integrated policy solutions were needed to achieve transition.
This includes achieving horizontal alignment with other policy areas to reduce skills mismatch and to remove other bearers to the skills.
She said skills development strategies, policies and funding should give consideration to the needs of the informal economy.
For more information, contact:
Teboho Thejane
Departmental Spokesperson
Cell: 082 697 0694
E-mail: Teboho.Thejane@labour.gov.za
