Empowering Workers

After years of getting paid to sew fabric by the piece, home-based worker Sujin Rungsawang never knew what she and her fellow workers were branded as. That is, until one day she was told by an activist that she was an "informal worker", who needed to have access to the social security programme.

"Back then it didn't matter what we were called. And none of us cared if we were provided with any benefits by the government," said the 60-year-old informal-worker-turned-activist. "All we cared about was how to feed our family each day and pay the rent and other bills every month."

But that's history now. Having access to social benefits greatly matters to Sujin and informal workers.

Brought up in Chachoengsao province, Sujin moved to Bangkok to help out at a relative's food stall after completing Prathom 4 (Grade 4), the compulsory education during that time. As she grew older she learned how to make dresses and earned a living from cutting patterns and sewing dozens of fabric at home in the Pratunam area for an attire factory.

But her life changed when her family, as well as thousands of dwellers in the area, were evicted from their homes and forced to move to Romklao in 1984. Before Suvarnabhumi Airport, the Romklao area was in the middle of nowhere and Sujin could no longer work for the attire factory. Subsequently, housewives in the community formed a working group and Sujin taught them how to make dresses. The group also earned extra income for their family by making school uniforms during a four-year project for the World Vision Foundation to give away to needy students.

But the sewing group didn't last and many of its leaders were left in debt; they lacked marketing and management know-how. All they knew was how to sew. None of them knew where to sell the products or how to win a deal with factories. Most importantly, none of them knew they could seek advice from a government agency or a district office.

"But now I know we are entitled to proper health care, knowledge and financial support," said Sujin, who now runs the Coordination Centre for Home Workers in Bangkok.

The role of activist came by chance.

In the late 1990s, Sujin became an informant for Homenet Thailand _ a network of at-home workers _ which sought information for reports on problems faced by home-based workers, in particular, their lack of access to social benefits. The objective was to improve the lives of informal workers and help them gain access to social benefits. Indeed, Sujin's involvement with the network changed her perception.

Through several meetings and discussions with other activists and informal workers, Sujin, who had always considered herself an entrepreneur running a small sewing shop and working on sub-contracts from factories, gradually learned that she, too, was just another informal worker _ a type of worker that contributes to national economic growth but remains invisible to society.

Factory workers, one of the lowest paid formal workers, are entitled to a lot of benefits, including monthly wages and social security, which means, Sujin explained, they are entitled to standard health care and eligible to receive retirement benefit. "But what do we have? Nothing!" the activist explained.

Sujin recalled the only way for people in her community, most of whom were informal workers, to cope with being sick was to simply buy paracetamol or cold and flu medicine from a pharmacy, mostly run by non-licensed pharmacists, in the neighbourhood. And they would only visit a clinic or hospital if they were seriously ill.

"Everyone was struggling to make ends meet and their livelihood and future relied on the piles of fabric in the house. So to stop working due to sickness meant zero income," Sujin added.

Over the past 15 years, Sujin has been fighting, alongside other activists, for the right for informal workers to have access to public benefits like social security. Remarkably, out of 39,317,200 workers in the country _ of which 24,586,800 are informal workers _ only about 600,000 are members of social security.

Still, what's been equally hard to fighting with the government for these rights is convincing her fellow informal workers to take action. Most workers don't want to "waste" their time in a meeting and not get paid. All the hours spent on fighting for public benefits means loss of opportunity for making more money.

"Most [informal workers] can't see beyond their day-to-day routine," said Sujin. Many accept whatever is provided to them by the government without arguing or fighting for what they deserve."

Sujin has tried to convince workers who share similar skills living in the same neighbourhood to form groups. Then as a group, they can seek financial advice, safety training or attend marketing courses at the district office.

Today, Sujin offers regular consultations to 10 sewing groups comprising 1,000 workers in Wang Thong Lang, Lat Krabang, Nong Chok, and Min Buri districts. And through this, her fellow sewers have learned from a work safety course that working with fabric in a closed room without proper ventilation can cause respiratory illnesses, especially in the long term.

"At the very least they've learned something and are able to educate others, as well," said Sujin.

"Everyone is eligible and has the right to have access to knowledge, funds and support from the government for their professions. And social security will help them be secure enough for their retirement. If you don't want to be abandoned by your children and spend the rest of your retirement in a temple, enrol in the social security system now.

"The welfare system will never work in the long run. Everyone has to contribute his or her part. It's a never-ending story; the government can't feed the people forever," Sujin explained.