Latin America and the Caribbean: Youth build proposals for the future

The young leaders of the BWI Regional Youth Committee for Latin America and the Caribbean (RYC-LAC) met online to mark their 4^th Statutory Meeting last 29 June. In the said meeting, the young trade unionists discussed the future of the Latin American youth in industries where BWI is present at to create a list of recommendations for the new RYC-ALC, which will be elected at the 5^th BWI LAC Regional Conference in 2023.

“As part of the current youth leadership, we head towards the 5^th BWI World Congress with the commitment to present our positions and ideas to continue strengthening our global union,” said Eliéser Córdoba, President of the RWC-LAC. 

“But our responsibility, as democratically elected leaders, does not end with the Congress. This is why we prepared a list of recommendations for the new RYC-LAC that will be elected in 2023 in order to support the new union youth leadership in strengthening our unions at the national level,” he stated.

The list of recommendations include the following:

• Promote youth-targeted trainings on key issues for the future of work: artificial intelligence, digitisation of the world of work, new mechanisms for collective bargaining and national and international trade union leadership.
• Create a Group of Young Union Tutors or Advisors (from BWI regionally-affiliated unions) to support specific activities or campaigns at the national level.
• Promote campaigns on environmental protection, clean construction, fair transition and the future of work.
• Actively campaign for further ratifications and actual implementation of ILO Convention No. 190 on Violence and Harassment at Workplaces.
• Continue promoting agreements and strategic alliances for youth-targeted professional skills certification.
• Establish alliances between unions from different countries in the region for the exchange of young union leaders who can travel and be professionally certified outside their countries.
• Promote strategic alliances amongst unions, community groups, students, peasants, etc. to establish lines of joint action that allow the working class to be involved into the union and social life of their countries.

The 4^th Meeting of the RYC-LAC was attended by Córdoba of SUNTRACS-Panama, José Luis López from UOCRA-Argentina, Ricardo Guerrero from FEDESOMEC-Ecuador and Everonne Samboe from SEBI-Curaçao.

Read the list of proposals