World of Work podcasts by the ILO

Many countries have a very young workforce. While this population dividend can have a positive impact on growth and development, young people often can’t find decent jobs in formal work settings. Now, there is a growing trend toward work that has gone on-line, and is staying on-line. This episode explores how digitalization through “crowd working” platforms can be used as a tool to tap into the la...

This podcast investigates the possibilities of using big data to analyse ongoing work trends in both developed and developing economies as a means of anticipating future work needs. It discusses different types of big data such as online job vacancies, and geospatial data sources such as satellite imagery with a view to seeing how such information can track and measure economic growth and other in...

Increasing digitalization and use of new technologies have pushed employment policies in new directions worldwide. In the wake of the recent pandemic, while there has been an increase in the number of workers in informal employment, digitalization and technology are also helping others transition to formal employment through a process called E-formality. At the same time, the digital and technical...

Tanto el trabajo forzoso como el trabajo infantil son problemas de gran importancia en México, un país pionero de la Alianza 8.7 que ha acelerado el paso para erradicar ambos abusos. En este podcast, analizamos las causas principales detrás del trabajo forzoso e infantil en México, lo que se está haciendo para combatir estos problemas, lo que falta por hacer y cómo lograr hacerlo. El podcast prese...

People are living longer than ever before in both developed and developing countries. And in both cases, older people either want to, or have to, keep working, often out of the realistic fear of falling into poverty. In this podcast Dorothea Schmidt-Klau, Senior Economist at the ILO’s Employment Policy Department, unpacks these trends in ageing in the world of work and how to address them.

This is the fifth episode of the ILO’s Social Finance Podcast on financial inclusion, impact insurance and sustainable investing. The podcast brings you insights from around the world, highlighting how financial services contribute to social and economic development. In this episode, we take a deep dive into the risks faced by women throughout their lifetimes. Lisa Morgan, Technical Specialist at...

This is the fourth episode of the ILO’s Social Finance Podcast on financial inclusion, impact insurance and sustainable investing. The podcast brings you insights from around the world, highlighting how financial services contribute to social and economic development. In this episode, we look at why and how impact investors are promoting employment as an impact theme. Lisa Morgan, Technical Specia...

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a devastating impact on the world of work. Lockdowns, restrictions on activity and movement, and economic turmoil have cut working hours and resulted in the elimination of millions of jobs. Preliminary evidence suggests that the recovery is not benefiting women and men equally, once again leaving women behind. The impact on women, and especially young women, has been...

This is the third episode of the ILO’s Social Finance Podcast on financial inclusion, impact insurance and sustainable investing. The podcast brings you insights from around the world, highlighting how financial services contribute to social and economic development. In Episode 3, we look at digital solutions for inclusive insurance. Lisa Morgan, Technical Specialist at the ILO, speaks with Jeremy...

Ce podcast plus long et plus approfondi (en français) examine les causes profondes communes du travail des enfants et du travail forcé en Côte d’Ivoire. Le podcast explore les actions des organisations d’employeurs et du gouvernement qui ont particulièrement bien réussi à s’attaquer à ces deux fléaux et esquisse les prochaines étapes. Le podcast présente des interviews avec Edouard Ladouyou de la...

Ulrika Bonnier from The Transnational Alliance to Combat Illicit Trade (TRACIT), an ILO GBNFL member, tells us how child and forced labour are linked to crimes and criminal networks and proposes actions.

WWF expert Corey Norton sets out how environmental degradation, child and forced labour are linked, and what some of the solutions are. This short podcast looks in particular at fisheries crimes.

This short podcast episode features an interview with Rainforest Alliance expert, Rachel Rigby, on how climate change increases vulnerability to child and forced labour and what we can do about it.

The COVID-19 pandemic has hit the world’s young workers hard. While the pandemic has had an unprecedented impact across the global workforce, youth have suffered greater job losses than other age groups. According to the latest ILO statistical update on the impact of COVID, which came out just before World Youth Skills Day on 15 July, employment of young people aged 15 to 24 fell sharply in 2020....

Two billion people – more than six out of ten workers in the world – make their living in the informal economy. The ILO estimates that some 1.6 billion of these workers have been significantly impacted by the COVID pandemic. Among them, women and young workers have been particularly hard hit. What is to be done? One emerging solution is technology. The ILO Centenary Declaration for the Future of W...

We often ask whether youth are ready for the future. But is the future ready for them? That’s the underlying theme, and the title of a recent, comprehensive book by the ILO on the youth employment challenge. In 2019, around 430 million young people were working but some 68 million, or more than 13.6 per cent were unemployed. What’s more, and ILO estimates that some 22 per cent of all youth (or rou...

The field of responsible business conduct has come a long way but has failed to consider and engage SMEs. Laura Spence, Professor of Business Ethics at Royal Holloway, University of London, sets out why and how SMEs should be included in the conversation.

Samuel Lee Moh Chuan, Senior Group HR Manager at the Wen Ken Group (Malaysia), discusses the impact of COVID-19 on Malaysian businesses, and the need to connect top down and local action on forced labour to really make a difference.

Global job markets are changing rapidly, driven by increased automation, new technology and demographic change among other factors. And over the past year, the COVID-19 pandemic has injected new uncertainty into this changing labour market. What are some of the medium- to long-term solutions to meeting these challenges? To address these trends and the policy response, the ILO Employment Policy Dep...

Douglas Opio, Executive Director of the Federation of Uganda Employers and Chair of the ILO GBNFL Steering Committee, explains why responsible business conduct should be at the top of each SME’s agenda and how to achieve it in practice.

The COVID-19 pandemic is impacting labour markets and livelihoods in advanced economies. But what is the impact on the world’s least developed countries, or L-D-C-s, which together account for 1.3 per cent of the global GDP, 13 per cent of the world’s population, and 40 per cent of the world’s poor. In this podcast, Aurelio Parisotto, Head of the ILO’s Employment and Economic Analyses Unit, provid...

Our natural world provides enormous opportunities for creating jobs and stimulating economies. More than half of the world’s GDP – some US$44 trillion – is moderately or highly dependent on nature. And globally, some 1.2 billion jobs in sectors such as farming, fisheries, forestry and tourism depend on the effective management and sustainability of healthy ecosystems. But today, the natural world...

How do we deal with the enormous crisis in employment during the COVID-19 pandemic? National employment policies play an important role in addressing this issue by providing a vital entry point for the crisis response and a way forward to a job-rich recovery. In this podcast, Chief of Employment, Labour Market and Youth Branch Sukti Dasgupta and Head of the Employment Strategies Unit Sher Verick o...

The COVID 19 crisis has laid bare the entrenched gender inequalities that, compounded with other inequalities, plague labour markets. As the latest ILO Monitor: COVID-19 and the world of work, fifth edition has shown, the employment of women is relatively at greater risk than that of men, due to their overrepresentation in the service sectors severely impacted by the crisis. In this interview, Val...

This is the second episode of the ILO’s Social Finance Podcast on financial inclusion, impact insurance and sustainable investing. The podcast brings you insights from around the world, highlighting how financial services contribute to social and economic development. In Episode 2, we turn our attention to Eastern Africa for insights from Kenya. In a discussion between Lisa Morgan, Technical Offic...