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G20: ILO head calls for measurable targets for job creation

Addressing the G20 summit, ILO Director-General Juan Somavia outlined concrete actions to address the global economic and social turmoil.

News | 20 June 2012
GENEVA – The head of the International Labour Organization (ILO), Juan Somavia, has urged G20 leaders to include measurable targets for job creation as key elements of crisis-recovery policies.

“Macroeconomic and other recovery policies need to set quantifiable targets for job creation,” said Mr. Somavia during his intervention at the G20 summit in Los Cabos, Mexico. “This can be done within your framework for strong, sustainable and balanced growth,” he added.

To create the 50 million new jobs needed each year to reduce global unemployment to pre-crisis levels, Somavia proposed four measures:
  • Employment-friendly investment in infrastructure and other job-intensive sectors;
  • Putting the financial sector at the service of the real economy by channelling much more of the liquidity being offered to the banking system to smaller enterprises;
  • Tackling youth employment on the basis of the Action Plan on youth employment adopted by the International Labour Conference on 14 June 2012;
  • Expanding access to basic social protection based on the landmark international labour standard on social protection floors adopted by the same Conference.
The head of the ILO welcomed the final G20 Leaders Declaration calling for sustainable and balanced growth to enhance job creation and reduce unemployment.

The focus of Los Cabos Action Plan on decent work (...) can help to turn what risks becoming a vicious downward spiral into a virtuous upward spiral."
“The focus of your Los Cabos Action Plan on decent work, incomes, quality jobs, youth employment, investment, important labour market measures, can help to turn what risks becoming a vicious downward spiral into a virtuous upward spiral,” he said.

Turning to the Rio+20 Summit which starts on Wednesday, Mr. Somavia called for a coherent blend of “employment and macroeconomic policies, social and environmental policies, trade and development policies within a sustainable development vision.”