Health, Safety and Environment - International Labour Organization

Manual 6:HOW TO RATIFY & USE ILO CONVENTION NO. 184ON SAFETY & HEALTH IN AGRICULTURETrade Unionsand the ILOThe ILO has as its central aim the protection of workers and promotion ofsocial justice. Although it has many shortcomings, just imagine if it did notexist and unions were to demand the setting up of a new UN agencycomposed the way that the ILO is now. It is also very unlikely that unionswould be able to make governments hold a conference every year to agreeinternational treaties on health and safety.So unions can use the ILO – and the IUF, which started the campaign for aConvention on agricultural workers’ health and safety – showed how it canbe done. What are International Labour Standards –Conventions and Recommendations?The system of international labour standards takes the form of Conventionsand Recommendations. They are negotiated at and adopted by thetripartite International Labour Conference, which meets every year inGeneva, Switzerland.InternationalLabourConventionsConventions are open to ratification by member States of the ILO. They areinternational treaties which are binding on the countries which ratify them.Once these countries voluntarily ratify Conventions, they undertake toapply them, to ensure that their national law and practice comply with therequirements of the Conventions, and to accept international supervision.Complaints about alleged non-compliance may be made by: the governments of other ratifying States or employers or workers’ organisationsProcedures exist for investigation and action upon such complaints. A latersection describes those procedures in more detail.There are already many ILO Conventions on safety and health. They fallinto four categories:1. This category provides for protection against specific risks. Forexample, safety in the use of chemicals at work, asbestos and guardingof machinery2. This category provides for protection in given branches of economicactivity, for example, construction. Convention 184 is of this type3. This category highlights measures of protection. For example, medicalexamination of young workers and prevention of occupational cancer4. This category sets out framework of guiding policies for action. Forexample, the Occupational Safety and Health Convention (155) andRecommendation, and the Occupational Health Service Convention(161) and Recommendation275 Health, Safety and EnvironmentA Series of Trade Union EducationManuals for Agricultural Workers