Zenroren holds discussion on efforts to organize the unorganized

The National Confederation of Trade Unions (Zenroren) on November 15 and 16 held an exchange meeting of "local unions" in Ito City, Shizuoka Prefecture, to discuss their efforts to organize unorganized workers.

The local union is an emerging union movement consisting of individual workers, including part-time, temporary, and contract workers, who have not unions to join in their workplaces. At present, there are 69 local unions with about 3,400 members. The Zenroren deputy secretay reported that 26 local unions were established in the past year in nine prefectures.

Participants in the meeting, the first of this kind, were determined to organize workers on unstable jobs, such as part-timers, into local unions and work on defending these workers' rights and living conditions.

A woman from an Osaka local union received great applause when she said, "Until three years ago, I knew nothing about the union movement. But when I was about to lose my job, the local union helped me and changed my life. I will start my career as a full-time union secretary next year." (end)