Employmentweb_low

EmploymEnT, woRk, and hEalTh inEqualiTiEs - a global perspective
labour rate in Brazil decreased from 13.7 per cent in 1995 to 8.2 per cent
in 2002 (ministério do Trabalho e Emprego, 2005a; 2005b).
slavery conditions persist, particularly in the agricultural and
extracting (mining) industries. Twenty-five thousand workers are
estimated to be living under slavelike conditions in Brazil (ministério
do Trabalho e Emprego, 2003). These workers are lured by verbal
contracts and transported over long distances to work in dangerous
conditions. They are induced to take out loans to pay for expenses like
housing and food, and face long and exhausting work hours. Their
debts continuously grow and they can never free themselves. The
ministry of labour and Employment has been acting directly against
slavelike situations through its special mobile Inspection group that
travels over the country to investigate slavery allegations and to apply
all necessary measures to free slaves. In order to carry out more
permanent actions, the Brazilian government created a national slave
labour Eradication plan (ministério do Trabalho e Emprego, 2003), and
responsibility is shared by various executive, legislative and judiciary
powers, the public ministry, and civil and international groups. The
plan has successfully mobilised qualified professionals to fight slavery
practices and to counsel workers about their rights.
according to official data, as relates to formal workers only, in
2005, 2,700 workers died and 491,000 were out of work and received
benefits from Workers Compensation Insurance due to occupational
accidents and diseases. The mortality rate of work injuries among
subcontracted workers was estimated at 40.4 per 100,000. This is
four times higher than the estimated rate for workers hired directly
(9.4 per 100,000 in the state of são paulo in 1990). The national
incidence of nonfatal work injuries was estimated to be between
1.6% and 5.8% (Wünsch filho, 1999; santana & loomis, 2004).
The creation of the ministry of social Development (msD) in
January of 2004 launched a significant increase in the budget for
social protection. programs for money transference, food and
nutritional safety, social assistance and inclusion in the labour
market have been implemented, with a substantial expansion of
coverage by the social assistance network. In 2005, over 50 million
poor and/or vulnerable persons were assisted by msD programs. In
may of 2006, the family Compensation program, the most
comprehensive program of conditional income transference, had 9.2
million families enrolled, accounting for 83.2 per cent of the
protected poor families in Brazil. In 2003, preexisting programs
were consolidated into a broad conditional income transference
program, and the family Compensation program was implemented
(Vaitsman, rodrigues, & paes-sousa, 2006).
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