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This meeting led by FISAC-CGIL Italy and co-organized by UNI Finance, UNI Africa and UGTT Tunisia, brought together key union leaders from the North and the South of the Mediterranean region. In fact, this alliance is not new as it started back in 2004.

Thanks to the financial support of UNI SCORE and FSU Sweden, the group now has a new window of opportunity to develop a concrete action plan between now and the beginning of 2013.

The Algerian Finance Union FNTBA-UGTA, organising about 30.000 employees, also decided to join UNI Finance.



The region has been strongly affected by the events of the Arab Spring, In some cases, like in Tunisa, the unions have been reinforced, as being seen as the leaders of the movement for freedom and democracy. In some other cases, like in Egypt, the union is now in a difficult position, having been an historical partner of the past government. The participants emphasized their will to work in solidarity with all unions to help them go through these difficult changes.



All the finance unions share the same interest for increasing their membership, and for increasing their bargaining power with multinational companies. The union in Tunisia has more than 70% density. In other countries, it is more around 30%. In Lebanon, the union is strong but the employers association has been challenging its status as an official partner for conducting collective bargaining, and the fight is still going on.The unions around the table expressed their wills to joint projects and alliances to help each other, in particular between the North and the South side of the Mediterranee.





The union leaders will now go back to their national work and work on a mapping exercise to identify the key targets, preparing for the work plan. The results of this survey will give us a clear picture of where the key multinationals are, in which cities and with how many workers and union members. Some of them include Société Générale, BNP Paribas and Intesa Saopaolo.



The participants will meet again in Alger or Beyrouth (depending on the conditions) at the end of February 2013 , to share the results of the survey, develop the action plan and formalize the regional alliances.