IFBWW trade union work
With our joint project in Chile,
the IWA and the CTF are doing
the kind of work that is a vital
part of the devel-
YAR) opment strategy
VQ of affiliates of
the Inter-
national Feder-

ation of Building and
Woodworkers.

The IFBWW, based in Geneva,
Switzerland, represents about 11
million workers organized into
285 unions in 124 countries. It
works to unite and represent all
free and democratic trade unions
in the building,
wood forestry
and allied
industries.

“The IFBWW is
an organization
that works all
over the world to
bring affiliates
together and protect and build
workers’ rights,” says IWA
national second vice-president
David Tones. “Our union has
gotten together with the CTF
and is carrying out the kind of
activities that other IFBWW.
members do. We're proud of
the progress that our education
project has made to date and
hope to expand into other areas,
perhaps in other countries.”

The IFBWW itself conducts
educational activities, coordi-
nates solidarity actions, and
researches a wide array of indus-
trial issues that affect workers
everywhere. It also works to
defend the interests of women
and youth, and advocates
against the use of child labour.

The federation has regional
offices in Malaysia, Panama and
Zimbabwe and sub-regional
offices in Australia, Burkina
Faso, India and Japan.

The IWA has increased its
activities in the IFBWW since the
mid-1990s.

= David Tones

Forced labour in Brazil

Brazil was the last country in the
Americas to ban the
import of slaves
from Africa
», and itis
/ one of the
So leading nations
in reintroducing
forced labour in the
21st Century says the
International Confederation of
Free Trade Unions. The ICFTU
cites different sources which say
between 1000-200,000 individu-
als are in effect slaves. Most are
employed in agriculture and
some “are forced, generally at
gunpoint, to cut down swathes
of forest ready for transforma-
tion into grazing land...” says a
May 2002 report. Most wood
that is gathered is then exported,

PHOTO COURTESY CTF
= Since March of 2000, when the IWA trained a group of instructors in Chile
(above), the CTF-IWA Education Centre, has made significant progress, devel-
oping several courses for confederation affiliates.

Making Chile a safer place for workers

Education

Centre sees

grad list rises

to 327

When CTF presi-

dent Jorge Gonzalez
and secretary-general Sergio Gatica
appear at this year’s IWA Canada con-
vention they will be bringing the news.
Since March of 2000, the jointly-
administered CTF-IWA Education
Centre in the southern city of
Concepcion has put 327 trade union
students through it!

The latest crop of trade unionists,
union affiliates with the National
Confederation of Forest Workers of
Chile, took week-long occupational
health and safety courses the weeks of
July 27 and August 5.

“We are very pleased to report to the
IWA and our affiliate unions, that the
courses went very well,” said Brother
Gonzalez, in a telephone interview
from Concepcion. “The course material
that the IWA helped us construct is
very practical for forest workers in
Chile.”

As reported in the last issue of the

Lumberworker (July, 2002) the OH&S
courses was written in April of this year
when Local 1000 president Joe da
Costa and Local 2693 member Rolando
Quintul, the IWA’s International
Solidarity representative, collaborated
with CIF Education Director Sergio
Gonzalez. Also assisting was an official
from the Chilean Association for
Health and Safety, Carlos Ackerknecht.

The new course is the fifth one
developed for the CTF. Among the top-
ics covered are how bipartite safety
committees work in Chile, risk identity
and prevention, workers’ rights,
employers’ obligations and workers’
responsibilities, and building union
activism.

To date, custom-written courses have
dealt with the following topics:
Leadership Training (Course 1), Activist
Training (Course 2), Introductory
Organizing (Course 3), Intermediate
Organizing (Course 4) and OH&S
(Course 5).

Following the convention, Brother
Gonzalez and CIF Secretary-General
Sergio Gatica will sit down with
Brother Quintul and others to write an
introductory course on collective bar-
gaining (Course 6) at the IWA’s nation-
al office in Vancouver.

“We're going to see where we can
help the CTF even though they don’t
have any rights in Chile to bargain
freely with their employers,” said IWA
national second-vice president David
Tones, officer responsible for
International Solidarity. “The course
will likely deal with strategies that
Chilean unions may look at to create
unity around collective bargaining
issues.”

Brother Gonzalez extends the CTF’s
appreciation to the IWA for its efforts
to date. “There are many things that we
have learned about each others’ coun-
tries and labour movements,” says
Gonzalez. “We hope to work with the
IWA for many more years.”

National IWA Dave Haggard says
awareness of the CIF-IWA Inter-
national Solidarity project is growing
among local unions and in the labour
community. “I think it's something every
IWA member can be proud of,” he adds.

In Columbia they’re
killing trade
unionists like flies

ALL YOU HEAR about in Colombia is
cocaine and criminals. But did you
know it’s the world’s most dangerous
place for unionized workers? Since
1986 over 3,800 trade unionists in that
country have been murdered in cold
blood. It’s hard to even understand
such insanity.

In 2001 alone, there were 169 trade
unionists murdered — more than twice
of the rest of the world combined,
according to the International
Confederation of Free Trade Unions.

The Canadian Labour Congress and
its affiliates, including the IWA, want
you to understand what is going on.
It's not just a shootout at the OK
Corral. There’s a systematic slaughter
of working people going on down there

and trade unionists in Canada and else-
where can speak out. That’s the mes-
sage delivered in an eight page black
and white comic book style brochure
published and sponsored by the CAW,
CEP, CUPE, USWA, CLC and the
IWA. The brochure, printed both in
English and French, was released at the
CLC’s convention in Vancouver in
June. It sketches the players in
Colombia: right-wing paramilitary
death squads; the Colombian govern-
ment and military, (sponsored by the
United States), murderous, kidnapping
left-wing guerillas, international bank-
ing institutions and corporations filling
their coffers. Oh yeah, armed drug
mafias are also in there, supporting
“everything from the army, to rebel
groups to even local development”
notes the publication. Caught in the
middle are union leaders, women’s
organizations, indigenous and rural
communities, church leaders and ordi-

= Contact the IWA’s national office
for copies of the comic book.

nary men, women and children.
Between 1986 and 1995, 36,000 civil-
ians have been murdered, many tor-
tured. As a Canadian you can find out
more, sponsor solidarity events, and
contact your local and federal politi-
cians. You can demand a stop to
Canadian and foreign investment in
lands where there is armed conflict and
crimes against humanity.

12 | THE ALLIED WORKER SEPTEMBER 2002