During February, Brazilian technicians from the International Labor Organization (ILO) will visit two African countries: Mali and Mozambique. Supported by the government of Brazil and the Brazilian Association of Cotton Producers (ABRAPA), the technical mission aims to streamline the implementation of the “Cotton with Decent Work” project.
Among the activities to be carried out during the period from 3 to 21 February are technical meetings, training workshops for labor inspectors and exchange of experiences. The objective is to guarantee the promotion of decent work and the fight against child labor in the cotton production chain.
The first stage of the technical mission begins in Bamako, the capital of Mali, Bamako, from 3 to 7 February. Among other actions, a committee will be created to supervise and evaluate the project. Also during the mission in Mali, Brazilian auditors will teach a technical workshop to train 25 Malian labor inspectors who work in the cotton-producing regions in the country.
The exchange of knowledge will allow Malian specialists to train their colleagues. The workshop will address techniques to identify deficits in decent work, as well as topics such as health, safety, and child labor monitoring.
The final stage of the mission will take place between February 17th and 21st in the Mozambican capital, Maputo. There, two training workshops will be held to promote decent work in planting sustainable cotton.
The first will train civil servants of the Ministry of Labor, Employment and Social Security (MITESS), who will have to prepare regulations for the protection of rural workers. The second workshop will train representatives of cotton producer associations.
+ Since 2009, the ILO has been developing the “Cotton with Decent Work” project in cotton producing countries in Africa and Latin America. The project has the support of the Brazilian Cooperation Agency (ABC) and the Brazilian Cotton Institute (IBA) Paraguay, Peru, Mali, Mozambique and Tanzania are the countries that have benefited so far.