Vietnam: ‘PM makes Historic Asbestos Ban Announcement’ - Advice from APHEDA

Advice from the Australian Union Aid Organisation APHEDA , read the Full story at  http://apheda.org.au/vietnam-asbestos-announcement/

The below is part extract from the http://apheda.org.au/vietnam-asbestos-announcement/  

Vietnam ban asbestos campaign – Vietnam Prime Minister responds with an historic announcement of a deadline to ban asbestos in the construction sector

" On 16 January 2018 the Vietnamese Prime Minister announced 2023 as the deadline for stopping the use of asbestos in the construction sector. This was the first time the Prime Minister has made such an announcement and it was made as he addressed the Ministry of Construction. The Prime Minister noted the ‘obstruction’ up to now by the Ministry of Construction in moving forward with a ban. A member of Vietnam Ban Asbestos Network (VNBAN), the ban network supported by Union Aid Abroad APHEDA, was also directly quoted by the Prime Minister in his nationally televised speech.

The VNBAN network of NGO’s and trade unions have worked hard for this win with awareness raising and advocacy activities in recent months. They continue to push for the ban date to be brought forward to 2020.

Another significant win in the campaign to ban asbestos saw the Vietnam Government shift from being one of the countries blocking the listing of chrysotile (white asbestos) on the Rotterdam Convention in 2013 to supporting the listing in 2017.  " 

Read the full story by APHEDA at http://apheda.org.au/vietnam-asbestos-announcement/

Asbestos - Local Government, Water and Electricity Affiliates across the Asia Pacific Region - see what WHO and APHEDA have to say in latest update from APHEDA.

" Desperate Measures Deployed by Asbestos Industry" 

Last year PSI Affiliates at the PSI Asia Pacific Regional Congress heard first hand on the  Asbestos problem facing Unions , including PSI Local Government, Water and Electricity Affiliates across the Asia Pacific Region 

As part of our ongoing work in this area , the following news item has been provided by APHEDA 

Over 60 countries have banned asbestos globally. The asbestos industry has been pushing the false ‘safe use’ argument for decades. The Canadian government was a supporter of the Chrysotile asbestos (white asbestos) industry up to their decision to ban asbestos from 2018. This has eroded the strong support for the ‘safe use’ of asbestos campaign.

Currently, the asbestos industry is trying desperate measures to ensure the Chrysotile asbestos market is not further reduced. They are combining misinformation with legal threats, as well as economic inducements to bureaucrats and politicians; and engaging in bullying tactics.

For example in Vietnam, the Roofsheet Association sent threatening letters to all members of the Vietnam Ban Asbestos Network members in 2015 to take “legal court action” for campaigning to ban asbestos in Vietnam. The industry also organised study visits to exporting countries Russia, Brazil as well as Thailand to demonstrate the safe use of asbestos for the National Assembly members (parliamentarians) and bureaucrats from Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia in 2014, 2015 and 2016.

Their propaganda on the safe use is disseminated through misinformation and deliberately trying to create confusion. The best example of this is the 5-minute documentary which the industry-funded Chrysotile Information Centre has posted on their website which states that “chrysotile fiber will be dissolved within 2 weeks in the body”. The irony of this is that on the one hand, they promote Chrysotile asbestos as one of the hardest fibers which is not damaged by high heat, fire etc. and then also state that it will be dissolved in 2 weeks within the human body. 

The World Health Organization (WHO) unequivocally says that white asbestos (chrysotile) is a carcinogen and a threat to human health. The WHO also supports a global ban on its use. Anyone suffering from or dying from an asbestos-related disease knows that the fibers do not dissolve in the body within 2 weeks.

Footage from Chrysotile Information Centre misinforming viewers that chysotileasbestos fibers in the lungs can dissolve within two weeks claiming the fibers don’t pose any risk to human health (compared to a group of minerals called Amphiboles which take 466 days to dissolve).

The industry has a wide network and engages in espionage activities (see New Matilda’s investigation, ‘Lethal Lies’ – Part 1 and Part 2). In 2015-2016, the industry deployed an agent to infiltrate the ban network to find out the tactics of ban groups and individuals, and also try to create conflict within the group and with others to weaken the movement.

The global ban asbestos campaign has definitely had an impact which is seeing the industry try any measure to continue to make a profit at the expense of human health. The asbestos lobby has now resorted to using the head of state to threaten bilateral relationships and economic harm. As pointed out by a Vietnamese journalist in June 2017, the president of Russia has informed his Vietnam counterpart that if Vietnam bans asbestos, it will harm the bilateral relationship and trade between the 2 countries.

Find out more about Union Aid Abroad’s ‘Asbestos. Not here. Not anywhere.’ campaign:  www.apheda.org.au/asbestos

5 things to know about the RCEP – the mega-trade deal engulfing our region , an article by Kate Lee, Executive Officer, Union Aid Abroad APHEDA

https://apheda.org.au/5-things-rcep/

Equality vs. Corporate Control: why we must defeat the RCEP

Five things you need to know about RCEP (image MSF)

The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) is the latest of the mega-trade deals to engulf our region. Compared to the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP), it is bigger and shrouded in even more secrecy. There are 16 countries involved including the 10 ASEAN nations – Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Indonesia, Myanmar Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, Brunei – plus China, Japan, India, Korea, Australia and New Zealand. Together these countries represent half of the world’s population.

Negotiations began in 2012 and are now in full swing with several sessions this year and the next session coming up in India in July. Here are five important things you need to know about RCEP:

1. Workers rights and migrant labour

The RCEP will do nothing to improve workers’ rights in its member countries. For trade unions and people’s movements already organising against the RCEP across Asia, the outlook is grim. If the RCEP is not killed off like the TPP, the poorest countries will become further impoverished. In addition, any benchmarks that OECD countries currently provide will be dragged down, ensuring lower regional standards and deepening inequality.

In particular, RCEP will dangerously impact the lives of millions of people across Asia where some of the world’s poorest people live. Where the largest movement of people looking for work occurs every single day in migrant labour. Where some of the world’s most tyrannical leaders suppress trade unionists and environmental activists. And where the impact of climate change runs hardest and deepest.

In 2015 the International Monetary Fund (IMF) released research which linked trade unions to declining inequality. The economically conservative organization said that trade unions play this role in two ways – by lifting wages at the workplace through bargaining, and by influencing social policy (on wages, social security, health care policy etc.).

Yet the state of repression of trade unions in our region shows that governments across Asia place inequality second to controlling organised labour. In Myanmar, unions have only been legal since 2012 and ongoing legal restrictions make it near impossible for a union to develop power in a single industry. In Thailand, workers’ organising is very heavily restricted and unions are dissolved if membership falls below 25% of eligible membership.

There are 26 million migrant workers travelling between countries of Asia-Pacific. In many Asian countries such as in Thailand, you cannot join a union if you are a migrant worker, so labour is fully exploited and often in the most horrific of circumstances. There are nearly 3 million migrant workers in Thailand, mostly from Myanmar and Cambodia and the slave labour undertaken by workers in the Thai fishing industry exemplifies this.

The RCEP will deliver nothing to improve workers rights in its member countries. No improved trade union rights, nor rights for migrant workers to organise.

2. Food sustainability and the environment

The RCEP contains no discussion on environmental rights or standards – meaning governments across Asia will be signing up to this agreement with no environmental safeguards in place. Millions of people across Southeast Asia and South Asia rely on small scale subsistence agriculture for a meager living or as a means to survive.

To date, Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) have jeopardized the livelihoods of millions who depend on the land. FTAs fight for market access in low-income countries by demanding the removal of non-trade barriers such as governmental regulations on land ownership.

Further, low-income countries aim to achieve the removal of barriers to agricultural trade but in countries like Australia agricultural tariffs are now negligible. Rich countries protect their farmers through income support (e.g. cash during a drought or farming tax benefits) and non-price subsidies (e.g. fuel subsidies to maintain agricultural viability). Removing barriers to agricultural trade in low-income countries leads to import surges in times of glut and production from countries like Australia. This displaces local production, meaning that in times of scarcity there is not enough local supply and food prices skyrocket producing hunger, and food scarcity.

Organised farmers across Asia are also worried about the impact of the RCEP on the seed trade. Currently an international convention known as UPOV 91 obliges a seed patent to be protected for 20 to 25 years. Trade partners were pushing ASEAN members to ratify UPOV 91 in the RCEP forum which will eliminate the right of farmers to save their own seeds. UPOV 91 ratification would worsen corporate domination as five multinational companies currently dominate 90% of the world’s seed trade. In essence, RCEP is a means for corporations to push for even more aggressive laws and regulations that criminalise farmers for sowing, keeping, exchanging, and taking care of their seeds.

3. Impact on Asia and rising inequality 

Inequality in Asia is rising and the RCEP will only exacerbate this. In the last two decades, 12 of 30 Asian developing economies, covering 82% of the region’s population, saw a worsening of inequality within their countries (World Bank). Research from the IMF shows that inequality impedes growth, causes crises, and weakens demand. Rising inequality also hampers poverty reduction. The Asian Development Bank (2012) says that “if inequality had remained stable in the Asian economies where it increased, the same growth in 1990–2010 would have taken about 240 million more people out of poverty—equivalent to 6.5% of developing Asia’s population in 2010 and 8.0% of those countries with rising inequality.” These statistics are shocking yet governments negotiating the RCEP see no risks to inequality in their secret trade deals. Export-oriented growth models can undermine ability to meet local needs, for example in agricultural societies, export-oriented growth has led to cash cropping and worked against sustainable self-reliant economies. This undermines both social and environmental sustainability. We need human-centred development and human-centred trade agreements!

4. Access to medicine

In Australia, Medicare is Gold. Across many parts of Asia, healthcare to any decent standard is a far-off dream – especially in poor countries with governments entrenched in corruption or with highly militarized regimes that consume most government spending (e.g. Myanmar). The RCEP will raise the cost of medicines by extending monopoly rights for pharmaceutical companies and also delay access to generic medicines. This would result in less people being able to buy cheaper medicines and will also see governments spending less on medicine, as costs will increase. The RCEP will threaten access to medicines and the poor and most vulnerable will suffer the most.

5. The worst elements of the TPP agenda are being pursued in RCEP negotiations

Despite relentless efforts of people’s movements to topple the TPP, several elements of the worst of the TPP agenda are being ruthlessly pursued by our governments and stand out:

1. The investor-state dispute settlement mechanism – allowing corporations to sue national governments when they think their rights are being infringed;
2. Stronger monopolies on medicines – Longer patents on medicines restricting the use of generic drugs
3. Privatisation of public services
4. Secrecy, no transparency in negotiations

But what can we do to fight RCEP?

Organise. AFTINET is a network through which we can all organise resistance. AFTINET has comparable national networks across the RCEP countries to fight the RCEP. Union and people’s movements are organising and speaking out. Other organisations with information about the RCEPs impact in Asia include the Transnational Institute (TNI), Third World Network, Focus on the Global South.

Make no mistake. RCEP is the new TPP. Our globally organised movements contributed to building power to make the TPP a political liability. Ultimately Trump dumped the TPP but there’s no doubt he will be back negotiating newer versions to benefit the US at the expense of the Global South.

We need to distinguish movements by workers-of-the-world and those seeking environmental protection from narrow nationalist protectionism aimed against workers in poor countries. We need to argue for new fair trade agreements whose primary purpose is to entrench workers’ rights and environmental sustainability. A great example is the Hemispheric Alliance (from Canada through to Latin America) that emerged in response to the FTA of the Americas and the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

We must, and we can defeat the RCEP, because our fight for an equal world depends on it. Because the health of an elderly person in Cambodia matters just as much as the health of our own child. Because our rights at work here are equally important to those of a Burmese man enslaved on a Thai fishing boat. And because there are organised networks of resistance across our region who want to work with us to defeat this.

Author: Kate Lee, Executive Officer, Union Aid Abroad – APHEDA

For more information on APHEDA and its work visit https://apheda.org.au/about-us/

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Rotterdam Convention 8th Meeting Kicks Off -- update from APHEDA -

http://apheda.org.au/rotterdam-convention-8th-meeting-kicks-off/

Right now and until May 5th, a group of trade unionists from around the world,  asbestos diseases victims groups, health and environment groups and ban asbestos networks have  descended on Geneva to campaign for the listing of Chrysotile asbestos as a hazardous substance, as the 157 countries who are parties to the Rotterdam Convention meet for the 8th time.

The Union Aid Abroad-APHEDA team in Asia and Australia have been campaigning on a number of fronts in recent months helping to build global networks, supporting our partner organisations throughout the world to raise their voices to their own governments where they choose to, directly talking with governments in SE Asia on the case for the listing of chrysotile, mapping government positions, and exposing the asbestos industry for its deadly lies and bullying tactics. 

While it should be a straightforward decision to list this killer fibre, as it has met all conditions for listing – for 10 years it’s been blocked by just a few countries – mostly those exporting it. It amounts to an effective veto by those countries who ignore the evidence and are exposing millions in developing countries to this and other carcinogens. They face no restriction to their deadly trade because they block listing.

This year the battle lines are drawn on a second issue – breaking the veto by allowing a 75% majority vote for listing a chemical where 100% consensus is not possible.

It will not be easy. Changing a Convention is difficult. However there are no other solutions on the table. No action at this meeting means continuing blocking of the listing of chrysotile, a convention that becomes more and more dysfunctional as more countries join and 100% consensus is less and less likely.

Don’t forget to sign the petition #StandWithRajendra if you haven’t done that yet. Last chance it closes on the 30th of April!! SIGN PETITION NOW!

Stay tuned!

Sign Petition - Demand Action on Asbestos NOW! 

Read the full story at http://apheda.org.au/rotterdam-convention-8th-meeting-kicks-off/

(Please see earlier OH & S items on asbestos at this blog, left hand side) 

PSI AP Local Government and Utility Unions are campaigning for Asbestos eradication from the Asia Pacific Region. Here is one opportunity to sign on and show your support for Asbestos Eradication ... by adding your name to the Labourstart and APHEDA Action for the Rotterdam Convention change !

One of the key issues that has emerged from last years consultations with PSI Asia Pacific Local Government and Utilities affiliates, was the need to be active on campaigning against the current use of asbestos in the Asia Pacific Region, not just within the community, but also in the use of Utility and other products that are exposed to Electricity, Water , Local Government workers as well as Emergency workers at times of natural disasters and waste collection , clean ups and more .

The ' Ban Asbestos Campaign ' has many Unions across the Asia Pacific Region and Globally standing up for this issues, can you join them, by lending your support, signing the Labourstart page and say NO to this dreadful products continued use. With the current action underway to have Asbestos listed onto the Rotterdam Convention. This is is an important step . 

If you can read the below, watch the video, follow the links and sign one, and pass onto friends and Colleagues , ever little bit will help-make the change !



The following is from the joint advice by Labourstart and the International Aid Organisation APHEDA 

https://www.labourstartcampaigns.net/show_campaign.cgi?c=3387

Stand with Rajendra - demand action on chrysotile asbestos now

" Rajendra Pevekar is a victim of the deadly global asbestos industry. His father worked in an asbestos company. As a result, both he and his mother now suffer from asbestos-related disease from secondary exposure. Rajendra will speak out on behalf of the 107,000 people who die annually from asbestos-related disease. In May, the meeting of the Rotterdam Convention will take place in Geneva and Rajendra will face representatives from countries who are blocking asbestos from being added to the list of hazardous chemicals.


For the last ten years chrysotile asbestos has been recommended for listing onto the Rotterdam Convention which adds restrictions to its trade. But it's been blocked by a few countries who gain directly from its export. This must stop. To overcome this problem, a group of 12 African countries have proposed an amendment to the voting system. The amendment calls for a 75% majority method of voting where consensus is not possible. This will enable dangerous chemicals to be listed that are now being vetoed. The amendment will make the voting process consistent with other conventions like the Basel and Stockholm Conventions.

Trade unions and ban asbestos networks globally stand with Rajendra. We call on all delegates to take two actions in Geneva. Firstly, delegates must support the amendment to the voting system. Secondly, delegates must support the listing of chrysotile (white) asbestos – an important step to restrict its trade."


Sign on at https://www.labourstartcampaigns.net/show_campaign.cgi?c=3387

This Labourstart action to support the changes to the Rotterdam Convention , is in partnership with  APHEDA http://apheda.org.au/rajendras-story/

Myanmar Water Festival holiday reduced from ten days to five – unions outraged ! Report by APHEDA

http://apheda.org.au/myanmar-water-festival-holiday-reduced-ten-days-five-unions-outraged/

BREAKING NEWS: 650 workers have been sacked for taking strike action over the public holiday dispute. More here

People play with water as they celebrate Myanmar’s New Year Water Festival of Thingyan in Yangon on April 13, 2016. (Reuters photo)

A number of Labour organisations from Myanmar’s Yangon Division have appealed to the Ministry of Labour stating that they can’t possibly agree with the Government’s announcement of reducing the Thingyan Water Festival from ten Public Holidays to five. For many workers in Myanmar this ten day break is an opportunity to return to home villages to visit family. Reducing the break to five days will prevent many of these workers from being able to make the journey home this year which can sometimes take days of travel.

Myanmar’s trade union confederations – the Confederation of Trade Unions Myanmar (CTUM) and Myanmar Industries Craft & Services Trade Union (MICS) – have both made their position clear to the director of the Labour Department at Pin-lone hall in Yangon. They stated that the decision to reduce the Thingyan holiday without consulting with workers and listening to their concerns is proof that the government doesn’t care about workers. They declared that when major decisions are going to be made, the government needs to take workers into account.

“Today I want to express to the Government via the ministry of Labor that in some factories, workers want to strike over this decision to reduce the Thingyan Water Festival holiday” said Ma Moe Wai, the Secretary of MICS. “The reason for the reduction given by the Government is that it will assist in the developing and increasing the national economy. The Government needs to understand that workers are fundamental to a strong economy and they should have been consulted before this decision was made”

U Myo Aung, the General Director of the Labour Ministry said that according to the Labour Law, the workers will get five public holidays during the festival and that employers should give workers five other public holidays throughout the year to compensate for the shorter leave over the festival. “I will discuss with employers and will surely tell them to give a total of 10 days of leave over the year; however this direction will be for this year, I can’t predict next year”.

Unions are now considering striking over the issue.

Author: Min Min Soe, APHEDA’s Labour Rights Reporter in Myanmar, 16 March 2017

UPDATE 30 MARCH 2017: 650 workers have been sacked for taking strike action over the public holiday dispute. Read more…