ASETUC/FES Workshop on Economic Integration and its Impact on Trade Unions and Workers
23rd - 24th October 2009, Bangkok (Thailand)

During the ASEAN Summit, more than 60 representatives of the ASEAN Services Employees Trade Union Council (ASETUC) met on October 24th, 2009, at the Plaza Athenee Hotel in Bangkok with their social partners from the ASEAN Senior Labour Officials Meeting (ASEAN SLOM), the ASEAN Secretariat as well as the ASEAN Confederation of Employeers (ACE) for their first tripartite dialogue at the ASEAN level. During this meeting, cooperation between these three partners of social dialogue was mutually developed and further collaboration was agreed upon. Before this tripartite dialogue, unionists from ASETUC - which consists of member-organisations UNI APRO (services sector), BWI AP (construction and forestry sectors) and PSI AP (public services sector) - reviewed the results of the assessment-study "ASEAN Economic Integration and its Impact on Trade Unions and Workers" (find here as download) which was conducted by an expert research team over a period of two months.

Together, the participants agreed upon a joint communiqué "Bridge the Gap: The Workers´ Voice in ASEAN Integration" (download here), which was discussed on the second day of the conference with ASEAN SLOM officials from Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Myanmar, Thailand, Viet Nam and the ASEAN Confederation of Employers (ACE) represented by APINDO, Indonesia and ECOT, Thailand and the ASEAN Secretariat led by Dr Donald Tambunan. The conference was jointly organised by FES Regional Trade Union Program Asia & Pacific and ASETUC.


Brainstorming Workshop: International Framework Agreements
"A suitable trade union instrument to engage MNCs in Asia?"
3rd - 5th June 2009, Singapore

Global Union Federations (GUFs) worldwide have started to engage multinational companies (MNCs) in the last ten years through the instrument of "International Framework Agreements" (IFAs). More than 70 of these agreements have been concluded thus and a couple of GUFs have also started company-based union networks, mostly on a regional level. Such contracts usually contain regulations regarding the application of the ILO Core Labour Standards, and sometimes agreements on wage systems, working hours or overtime, as well as the establisment of monitoring systems between the trade union and the MNCs. In the scarce literature on IFAs in Asia, they are often considered to be an instrument strengthening workers and trade union´s rights in developing and threshold countries. On the other hand, almost all IFAs were initiated and negotiated by European trade unions – often without the proper involvement of trade unions from other regions. In Asia, only one Asian MNC (Takashimaya/UNI) has signed an IFA thus far and experienced knowledge about the usage of IFAs and their benefits for workers´ and trade unions´ rights is very rare. With this brainstorming workshop in Singapore, FES Regional Trade Union Program started an open exchange of experiences between GUFs in Asia about their experiences and usage of IFAs in Asian countries as well as their involvement in negotiations. Furthermore, all participants discussed if IFAs are suitable ways in Asia to engage MNCs and evaluated the different strategies of GUFs concerning this instrument. They also took part in an assessment study of IFAs in the Asia-Pacific region.