A tripartite technical discussion organized by the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs and the International Labour Organization (ILO) together with Labour Unions deliberated on minimum wage setting system with the theme ‘Possible Roadmap Towards a Minimum Wage System for Ethiopia’ in Bishoftu May 14-15, 2019.
The ILO Five-year Programme ‘Advancing Decent Work and Inclusive Industrialization in Ethiopia’ implementation was launched in April 2019 aimed at improving respect of workers’ rights leading to greater incomes and compensation, and enhanced safety, equality, voice, and representation. The program also aims to lift industrial productivity and competitiveness to assist sectors become globally competitive and encourage accountable and transparent government institutions.
Cognizant of the program the tripartite technical discussion in its conclusions highlighted that as Ethiopia has embarked on a journey towards industrialization and building up investment in infrastructure, the creation of employment and decent work that brings about increased productivity and competitiveness is a key priority in the development efforts in Ethiopia, according to EHPEA staff members who participated the discussion.
Furthermore, it was indicated that an inclusive and job rich growth through decent work is the backbone for achieving the Growth and Transformation Plan vision of attaining a middle-income economy by 2025. At a national level, the project has started facilitating social dialogue among multiple stakeholders in developing common vision and strategies to support the country’s endeavours to become an African hub of socially responsible production both for global and domestic market.
As the program aims to support fixing minimum wage as well as enhancing the capacity of government institution to prevent and resolve labour dispute, the tripartite technical discussion is said to have been instrumental.
The discussion was attended by representatives and experts came together from the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs, Regional States Bureaus (Amhara, Oromia, Addis Ababa, Benshangul-Gumuz), EHPEA and Labour Unions.
According to the Ethiopian Herald Vol. lXXV published 11 May 2019, the Confederation of Ethiopia Trade Union (CETU) has already submitted request to the House of People’s Representatives (HPR) to set a national minimum wage with the objective of addressing complaints occurring in connection with salary payments.
In order to ensure occupational health and safety, establishing a sustainable workplace injury prevention, protection and compensation system is quite essential. At a factory level the ILO project is providing demand-driven capacity building support informed by assessment results. The support is geared towards improving the participating factories productivity, working conditions and industrial relation to make the factory competitive in local and international market. The program also aims to improve supervisory and HR skills as well as incorporate gender equality and diversity principles to encourage women worker to reach leadership.
