The South African Informal Traders Alliance (Saita), together with the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation, and Arbitration (CCMA), will run a one-year programme to upskill informal businesses in effective labour and employee relations practices. It will be rolled out nationally and facilitated online.
Representing over 2 million informal and micro businesses, the Saita plans to reach approximately 20,000 workers across the informal economy over the next year.
Paul Bester, national director of informal sector support at Saita, says: “This is an exceptionally important achievement for Saita as it accelerates our goal of formalising the informal sector as part of our commitment to the International Labour Organisation’s (ILO) R204 programme.”
The ILO’s Recommendation 204 (R204) aims to facilitate the transition of workers from the informal to the formal economy, while respecting workers’ fundamental rights and ensuring opportunities for income security, livelihoods and entrepreneurship.
The training provided to Saita by the CCMA covers a wide range of training modules, including:
- Building workplace, relations
- Managing conflict in the workplace,
- Dealing with sexual harassment in workplace,
- Effective negotiation skills, and
- Workplace discipline and managing incapacity.
“It is essential for the informal sector, as an incubator for jobs and entrepreneurship, to possess the fundamental skills required to manage employees effectively. This preserves and protects an employees’ rights, ties the sector more closely to the laws of the country and, importantly, also provides the foundation for their overall integration into the formal economy,” says Bester.
