World's poor see few job benefits from trade boom

By Laura MacInnis

GENEVA (Reuters) - The boom in global trade over the last two decades has failed to improve the quality of most jobs in poorer countries, the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and United Nations labour agency (ILO) said on Monday.

Their joint report, whose conclusions may make a new global free trade pact even harder to swallow for some, found that most workers in developing countries still have low incomes and limited job security, even in sectors tied to exports.

This situation was likely to worsen as a result of the global financial crisis, it said.

While international trade grew to represent more than 60 percent of global gross domestic product in 2007, from less than 30 percent in the mid-1980s, the number of informal workers has stayed constant or even grown in poorer states.

"Strong growth in the global economy has not, so far, led to a corresponding improvement in working conditions and living standards for many," the Geneva-based organisations said.

"With around 60 percent of employees in developing countries working in the informal economy, large parts of society are deprived of adequate income and career opportunities."

Informal workers in areas such as construction, agriculture and mining generally do not pay tax or have benefits such as disability insurance or pensions. They remain as vulnerable now as before the trade boom, the report said.

"Even in the formal economy, a growing proportion of workers is undeclared or works under precarious conditions," the WTO's Pascal Lamy and ILO chief Juan Somavia said in the report. "These outcomes are likely to worsen as a result of the global financial crisis."