Tag Archives: Malawi

What does water have to do with work? In Malawi, plenty

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Guy Ryder, Director-General of the International Labour Organization

Carlos Carrion-Crespi, Specialist for public services and utilities sectors

Recently I travelled to Malawi to discuss jobs and water with Ministers, worker and employer groups. While there, I recalled that on World Water Day this year the President of the country, Peter Mutharika, was one of a number of heads of state who gave international recognition to the links between employment, development and managing our scarce water resources.

“Provision of potable water and good sanitation will directly result in poverty reduction as healthy people contribute to the development of the country (Malawi),” he told an audience in Malawi’s second city Mzuzu, on March 22.
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What can the fight against HIV teach us about Ebola?

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Margherita Licata and Kofi Amekudzi

Margherita Licata and Kofi Amekudzi, Technical Specialists ILOAIDS

The more we learn about the challenges of responding to the Ebola Virus Disease  in West Africa, the easier it becomes to discern parallels to the HIV epidemic —  another health crisis , which we’ve been battling for over 30 years now. The HIV response has some valuable lessons for the way we confront the disease in general, particularly in the workplace. Here’s an example.

About four years ago, we were working in southern Malawi with the ILO Programme for HIV/AIDS on a project targeting workers at the Lujeri Tea Estate. Though the rate of new infections has slowed, Malawi still has some of the highest HIV infection rates in the world, affecting one in every four people who lives there.

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How I went from child labour to a prestigious academy

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Emmanuel Amon, 18, was removed from child labour with help from ILO’s Country Programme in Malawi. He recently completed his studies at one of Malawi’s most prestigious schools.

A tobacco plantation isn’t a safe or healthy place to work for a child, but it was the only way my family could survive. My parents are poor farmers and barely able to support a family of eight on MK20,000. This is about US$ 50 per year. I had nothing. My parents are tobacco tenants and we all had to work together as a family. I’ve been working in tobacco since I was five. Attending school was never an option for me.

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