Regional trade unionists urged to aid policy-making process

Caribbean trade unionists have been called upon to rally together and encourage their respective governments to drive policies that would ensure safe-keeping and better living standards for all workers.

The call was made by Guyana’s Parliamentary Opposition Leader, Bharrat Jagdeo, when the over 35 trade unionists gathered on Wednesday in Georgetown for the 5th Regional Conference of the International Union of Food at the Grand

Coastal Inn, on the East Coast of Demerara.

Jagdeo, in delivering the opening remarks, said he was very much concerned about the direction countries within the Region are taking, particularly in areas that should be generating wealth and improving the living standards of the working class.

“I think we can do a better job in whatever we do if we understand that. And most of you would know that it seems as though we have a failure of policy-making. That if someone would ask where would our Region be in five years from now, what will be the composition of its economic structure, which will be the most vibrant sector creating wealth for our people and creating employment opportunities for them, I think most countries would be hard-pressed to give precise answers to these questions,” the Opposition Leader said.

He said Caribbean countries have clung to traditional sectors, without addressing them to make them more competitive. According to Jagdeo, if these are not addressed urgently; the Caribbean runs the risk of losing wealth in absolute terms

and being left behind from the rest of the world.

Jagdeo zoomed in on what he described as a heavy indebtedness of the Region. He made reference to Guyana and the state his People’s Progressive Party Government had found it when it took office in 1992, recalling that the country had to use most of its revenue to service the debt.

“When debt occupies so much of country’s economy, how can you find resources to stimulate the economy, improve social services and pay workers more money,” he asked, noting that trade unionists and workers have to pay attention to government’s debt profile in the Region, since the servicing of debt takes away the ability to create the fiscal space, an argument governments usually use.

“So it leaves very little to create incentives for the sectors and paying public servants more. You cannot not notice what is happening in the Region,” he said.

According to Jagdeo, most of the countries in the Region have gone in the opposite direction, as debt payment now occupies more than half the revenues. In Jamaica, he said over two-thirds of the revenue goes to debt.

Alluding to the productive sector, Jagdeo said much more has to be done by Caribbean countries to reconstruct the sector so that it could continue benefiting the economies.

“In Trinidad and Tobago it is oil and gas, most of the other countries it is tourism. But are these sectors going to be the sectors in the future to produce the wealth. There has not been a single in-depth assessment at the national level on how we are going to make some of these sectors competitive,” Jagdeo said, continuing that years have been wasted at the highest policy-making level.

Jagdeo spoke too of Climate Change and its consequences on the region and its economy.

“We are small open economy; a single hurricane wipes out the equivalent of about 75 per cent of GDP. The Region is very vulnerable and trade unionists cannot ignore this challenge and if we cannot get international help for mitigation and more particularly for adaptation for climate change then what will happen is that the limited money that we have that should go to wages and generating jobs and social services will now have to go to address climate change.”

He again cautioned the Trade Unionists that they needed to be involved in the fight for climate financing. “Because it is a justice issue too… Most of the greenhouse gases that have been accumulated, we did not put it there, but we are involved in the biggest fight. Trade Unionists have to be engage in that fight.”

The International Union of Food, Agricultural, Hotel, Restaurant, Catering, Tobacco and Allied Workers’ Associations (IUF) is a global union federation of trade unions, founded in 1920. The organisation traces its history to 1889 when the International Federation of Tobacco Workers was founded and which merged into the IUF in 1958.

The organisation represents workers employed in agriculture, the preparation and manufacture of food and beverages, hotels, restaurants and catering services and in tobacco processing.