Globalization and the informal economy: how global trade and investment impact on the working poor

This paper seeks to pull together existing empirical evidence on globalisation and the informal economy with a special emphasis on women workers and producers. It shows how globalisation tends to lead to shifts from secure to insecure forms of employment and to more precarious forms of self - employment. It also recognises that globalization can indeed lead to new opportunities in the form of new jobs for wage workers and new markets for the self-employed.

The authors argue that there is adequate data that could shape the policy agenda to assist producers/workers in the informal economy to maximize the positive aspects of globalisation and to minimize the negative aspects.

Recommendations include:

• distinguishing between micro-entrepreneurs/ own account producers and sub contractors and casual workers as a first step to designing appropriate policies.
• promoting policies to promote knowledge of , access to and bargaining power in markets.
• policy interventions that would govern and protect employment relations of sub-contractors and casual workers.
• additional research and statistical studies to document the number, contribution and working conditions of specific groups of informal economy producers/ workers in specific subsectors; and to assess the impact of globalization on them;
• action programmes to help informal producers/workers gain access to (and bargain effectively within) labour and product markets (both local and global).

This document is also available in french and in spanish