1. About the ILO
2. Topics
3. Regions
4. Meetings and events
5. Publications
6. Research
7. Labour standards
8. Statistics and databases

Contents

Introduction

1. Promoting democracy and fundamental workers' rights

The ILO declaration
International labour standards
Child labour
Tripartism and social dialogue
Employers' activities
Workers' activities
Labour law and labour relations
Labour administration
Improving social and labour conditions in multinational enterprises and export processing zones
Priorities and guidelines for improving social and labour conditions in EPZs
Sectoral activities

2. Promoting employment and combating poverty

Employment strategies
Labour statistics
Training
Enterprise development
Microfinance
Cooperatives
Employment programmes for the poor
Women in development and excluded social groups

3. Protecting working people

Occupational safety and health
Conditions of work
Violence at work
Drug and alcohol abuse prevention programmes
Social security
Equality for women in employment
Action against HIV/AIDS
Migrant workers
Persons with disabilities

4. Turin Centre and International Institute for Labour Studies

Turin Centre
International Institute for Labour Studies

5. Active partnership: Regional activities

Africa
The Americas
Arab States
Asia and the Pacific
Europe and Central Asia

6. Service and support

Annexes

Introduction

The ILO Programme and Budget for 1998-99 addresses three main objectives, which therefore provide the framework for reporting in the present document:

• support to democracy and fundamental workers' rights;
• promoting employment and combating poverty;
• protecting working people.

The first three chapters of this Report summarize the ILO's activities in these three priority areas. Chapter 4 concerns the activities of the International Institute for Labour Studies and the ILO's Turin Centre. More detail may be found in Chapter 5 of activities in the five regions: Africa, Americas, Arab States, Asia and the Pacific, and Europe and Central Asia. A sixth chapter describes service and support activities in the Office. The Report also contains a number of annexes covering action taken on resolutions adopted by the International Labour Conference, appropriations and expenditure for the biennium, technical cooperation expenditure, meetings and publications. As with the previous edition, the current Report is available on the Internet, with hyperlinks to a wealth of ILO documentation.

As reported below, late in the biennium, the Governing Body and International Labour Conference decided upon a new strategic approach to the ILO's work in the framework of the Programme and Budget for 2000-01. While a number of activities were launched in 1999 in this new framework, the Report as a whole follows the structure established in the Programme and Budget for 1998-99.

In addition to programmed activities in 1998-99, the ILO intervened during the biennium as major events unfolded in the world labour arena. These developments and the ILO's reactions to them are also described in this Report. One example is the ILO's response to the Asian financial crisis which, through its analysis of the causes and effects of the crisis, helped to draw attention to social issues and the necessity of strengthening democratic institutions in affected countries. Another development was the adoption of the ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work and its Follow-up by the Conference in 1998. For the ILO's constituents the adoption of the Declaration marked a renewed universal commitment to the basic rights and principles that underpin democracy, equity, economic efficiency and sustainable development. For the ILO the Declaration has provided a renewed stimulus and mandate to focus its activities on the fundamental rights for which it has special competence.

The activities carried out in 1998-99 constitute the last episode of the ILO's work in the twentieth century, a century that saw the creation of the Organization, its development into an international centre of reference on labour matters, and the establishment of a substantial programme of technical cooperation and advisory activities. The ILO and its message of peace and progress through social justice remains, despite the social and political upheavals of the last century, as relevant as when it was established in 1919.

Nevertheless, the world of the new millennium presents major challenges. In the last two decades the emergence of globalization, trade liberalization and regional integration have brought changes to the world's economic and social environment that have dramatically affected labour markets, employment patterns and labour relations. Although it was well placed to play a pivotal role in the emerging global economy by virtue of its unique position as the international reference point for knowledge on employment and labour issues, as the centre for standard setting in the world of work and as a platform for international debate and negotiation, the ILO needed to adapt itself to changed circumstances.

The new Director-General's reform process

On taking up office in March 1999 the new Director-General of the Organization, Mr. Juan Somavia, initiated a process of reform and modernization in the ILO at three interlocking levels:

• formulation of a strong tripartite consensus around the Organization's substantive priorities and the main focus of each priority;
• reallocation of budgetary and extra-budgetary re-sources to implement them through the Organ-ization's programme of work; and
• the corresponding adaptation of the management structures and programme activities to make them operational.

Thus, in addition to carrying out the activities programmed for 1998-99 and described in this Report, the ILO began to prepare itself intensively to take up the challenges presented by the new global economy in the twenty-first century. 

Strategic budgeting

The second year of the biennium, 1999, saw the setting in motion of a process of strategic budgeting, in a move away from the previous structure based on 39 major programmes to one centred on four strategic objectives (standards and fundamental principles and rights at work; employment; social protection; social dialogue) and their corresponding operational objectives -- each strategic objective contributing to the ultimate goal of decent work for all. Under each strategic objective a number of international focus (InFocus) programmes of high priority, relevance and visibility were identified in order to concentrate and integrate activities already under way while responding to new needs and demands for maximum impact and coverage. The budget review undertaken during 1999 revealed opportunities for increases under some budget envelopes and reductions in others. Changes were introduced in order to reinforce the technical services available to constituents and to provide an increase in resources devoted to gender equality, while resources for policy-making organs, support services and management services were reduced. Development needs and gender dimensions are cross-cutting issues that are taken into account in defining specific activities under all the strategic objectives. The Programme and Budget proposals for 2000-01 that were prepared along these lines met with strong consensus in the Governing Body in March 1999,⁽¹⁾ at the International Labour Conference at its 87th Session in June 1999 (at which the budget was adopted unanimously)⁽²⁾ and in the Governing Body at its 276th Session in November 1999.⁽³⁾

Decent work

The Director-General's Report to the 87th Session of the International Labour Conference entitled Decent work ⁽⁴⁾ sought to focus the energies of the Organization on the major problem of this period of global transition -- securing decent work for women and men everywhere. It aimed to bring the four strategic objectives together so as to:

• send out a single message on what the ILO intended to do;
• translate this vision into the realities of programme priorities and capabilities; and
• view the ILO's activities from the perspective of the various regions of the world, thus reflecting the developmental and institutional diversity of people who experience an increasingly common world of work in different ways.

The ensuing Conference debate on this important Report crystallized the consensus of the Organization's tripartite membership on the strategic framework of the ILO and on its ultimate goal of decent work for all, and sent a focused message about the Organization to world opinion. 

Restructuring, priority setting and management reforms

In the final semester of the biennium the strategic objectives became the basis for the development of structural reforms and management initiatives. A Senior Management Team was formed at headquarters, the Office's technical programmes were restructured around the four strategic objectives and an internal structure was established for each technical sector. For each operational objective work began on identifying performance indicators, establishing cost-effective ways of measuring progress for each indicator, and setting realistic but challenging targets for achievement within the biennium. An in-depth review of the Office's monitoring, evaluation and reporting system was started with a view to making it more flexible and responsive to the new strategic budgeting framework. Eight InFocus programmes were established after intensive consultation inside the Office and with constituents, both in Geneva and in the regions.

Gender equality

The new Director-General pledged his full support to advance gender equality and to lead efforts to promote a strong consensus on this goal within the Organization. To achieve this aim immediate steps were taken in 1999 to upgrade the Office of the Special Adviser on Women Workers' Questions to the Bureau for Gender Equality reporting directly to the Director-General. The Bureau produced an action plan for gender mainstreaming. In addition, qualified women were appointed to a particularly high proportion of the senior positions that were made available by the creation of the InFocus programmes. The technical sectors took steps to introduce gender mainstreaming as a central part of their work while maintaining important gender-specific projects.

The regions

An exceptional effort was made to involve field staff in the restructuring and priority setting. A review was launched of measures to strengthen field services and to make them even more responsive to ILO constituents and priorities. The purpose of the review was to find means of better integrating and coordinating work under the strategic objectives and to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of the systems for delivering programmes which service constituents and advance the Organization's objectives.

Support services

Efforts were also made by the support services to improve the quality of their work while identifying savings that could be used for action in favour of constituents. In addition to the savings identified, progress was made in setting service standards so that results-based budgeting techniques applied throughout the Office.

Strategic planning -- The 2000-01 biennium

The above management initiatives and structural reforms are continuing and are being reinforced in the 2000-01 biennium, with the strategic objectives as the starting point for strategic planning. As a result of these management reforms, the Organization as a whole had a greater sense of its strategic direction. At the close of the 1998-99 biennium the first signs were already apparent of a streamlining of operations, a more transparent programme and a new climate of openness and participation within the Office.

It was decided that reports on programme implementation should be presented each year to the March session of the Governing Body. A first report would be presented in March 2001 covering the year 2000. A report covering the whole biennium would be presented in March 2002.

Notes

1. Governing Body doc., GB.274/PFA/9/1.

2. Governing Body doc., GB.274/PFA/9/1, re-issued as a supplement to Report II, International Labour Conference, 87th Session, Geneva, 1999.

3. Governing Body doc., GB.276/PFA/9.

4 Decent work, Report of the Director-General, International Labour Conference, 87th Session, Geneva, 1999.

Updated by HK. Approved by RH. Last update: 30 May 2000.