African home-based workers are at the bottom of craft supply chains. Through an increased understanding of those supply chains they could overcome some of the challenges they are facing and improve their livelihoods.
2021 was another tough year for informal workers. The crisis is by no means over for them, so we're looking at what we have learnt from the pandemic in 2021, so that workers can be supported better in 2022.
À medida que a gente se aproxima do final de 2021, bilhões de pessoas têm sido vacinadas contra a COVID-19 – sendo a vacinação amplamente considerada como a saída dessa pandemia que continua prejudicando os meios de subsistência no mundo todo. Ainda assim, a estratosférica desigualdade na distribuição das vacinas em nível mundial expressa que muitas pessoas, incluindo aquelas que trabalham no emprego informal, têm sido excluídas.
As we near the end of 2021, billions of people have been vaccinated against COVID-19 – widely regarded as the best way out of this pandemic, which continues to disrupt livelihoods around the world. Yet, massive global inequity in vaccine distribution means that many more, including a huge number of informal workers, have missed out.
It is fair to say that there are a number of legitimate and often complex challenges that governments face in expanding social protection to workers in the informal economy. These include legal, financial, administrative and institutional barriers. Yet, there are also plenty of examples from around the world, which prove that with some ingenuity, flexibility, and an ear to informal workers, these challenges can be overcome.
Informal workers dominate the region’s labor market in both urban and rural areas. More than half of the workforce in most Southeast Asian countries earns their living in the informal sector, with the proportion surpassing 80 per cent in Cambodia and Myanmar. Yet, governments in the region barely recognize their value, as highlighted by the scant attention they were given in their country’s COVID-19 response.
