Nepal

WSM partners with two of the largest independent trade unions in Nepal, GEFONT and NTUC, and the umbrella organisation of trade unions, ITUC-NAC. Their supported activities focus mainly on labour standards and social security, and for a small part on vocational skills for informal workers. To promote labour standards, GEFONT (with a strong focus on young workers) and NTUC plan to do awareness raising by reaching 500.000 workers; providing basic training for 6.300 members and advanced training to 1.280 leaders. They will provide legal assistance to 1.000 workers and also research the working conditions and employment status in the informal sector and multinationals for political action, for which they will mobilise 25.000 workers and stakeholders.

Through the umbrella organisation ITUC-NAC, trade unions lobby for changes in legislation and regulations relating to social protection, which benefit the 15 million Nepali workforce directly. Partners have drafted and introduced a bill for universal  social security in Parliament. As  vocational training, NTUC provides training to 350 informal and home based workers. As crosscutting issues, partners focus on gender and environment, specifically climate change, and especially young workers.

• Nepal Trade Union Congress (NTUC): NTUC is one of the three largest confederations in Nepal. It includes about 25 trade unions, working with the formal or informal sector, in the private and the public, such as education, construction,  textiles,  clothing,  catering  industry,  transportation  or  informal  businesses typically as craftsmen, hairdressers or artisans. NTUC has over 400,000 members. NTUC focuses on child labor, promotion of health and well-being at work, training workers about their rights, promoting gender equality and a universal social security system.

• General Federation of Nepalese Trade Unions (GEFONT): GEFONT was founded in 1989 and officially registered as trade union organization in 1995. Currently, GEFONT includes thirty unions from various sectors: agriculture, textiles, transport, tourism, health, banking and the informal economy. All these unions are struggling in their own way to improve working and living conditions of Nepalese workers and families. GEFONT has more than 300,000 members, making it one of the three largest countries in the union. WSM particularly supports GEFONT for their work with vulnerable workers such as those from the informal economy, young and women workers, but also migrant workers.

• International Trade Union Confederation - Nepal Affiliate Council (ITUC-NAC): The three largest unions in Nepal, GEFONT, NTUC and the Maoist union formed the ITUC-NAC umbrella organisation, which is the driving force behind an intense and effective cooperation between 11 trade unions. Here they agree on common positions and advocacy strategies, covering various issues: social protection, occupational health and safety, labour standards etc.

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