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The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organisation [AFL-CIO] is a national trade union center of United States. Anjali Sinha, India Coordinator UNI MEI and Bro. James Sauber Chief Manager of the National Association of Letter Carriers (NALC]) visited the AFLI-CIO Office in Washington on May 12 and participated in its weekly meeting. In the said weekly meeting, AFL CIO affiliates from all the industries would meet to update each other on the activities and efforts each union has made towards the current campaign. Presently, AFL CIO is working towards the Employee Free Choice Act campaign (EFCA) and has a number of activities to support the campaign.

The EFCA Campaign is fighting for the enactment of a law, i.e. the Employee Free Choice Act. The campaign is supported by a bipartisan coalition in Congress which would enable the workers to bargain better working conditions, benefits and wages by restoring workers’ freedom to choose and make an independent decision to whether join a union or not. This would enable them to remove obstacles to employees who want collective bargaining, so as to guarantee that workers who choose collective bargaining are able to achieve a contract and allow employees to form unions by signing cards authorizing union representation.

It goes without saying that the law, when enacted would pose challenges to unionization work in the USA. As such there are mixed reactions on the same, however most of the workers are keeping fingers crossed for the act to be passed by the current government.

The US national federation of labour, AFL-CIO, is made up of 65 national and international unions including those in Canada. They together represent more than 10 million workers. AFL CIO was formed in 1955 when the AFL and CIO merged.

Anjali Sinha as a UNI representative was introduced by James Sauber, NALC in the meeting and was greeted by the AFL CIO and its affiliates. Sis. Anjali, her part, conveyed greetings on behalf of UNI. She gave brief presentation of UNI and its global work, current areas of focus, i.e. organizing and challenges faced by the ongoing globalization and inherent competition to reduce costs of production / delivery of services. She, informed that India too is not untouched by the current financial crisis as Indian companies are facing fall in demands. Worst affected are those that are closely linked to foreign trade, such as IT and ITeS, retail, real-estate, etc. She also gave an insight into UNI work in India and its relationship with the Indian trade union movement relationship.