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UNI Global Union’s Management Committee has adopted an ambitious new plan to drive union organising and union capacity-building around the world.



UNI’s management committee met in Nyon, Switzerland, from May 7 to 8 to push forward its agenda to support union organising, sign more global agreements with multinational corporations and take on other vital union and worker issues.



As it looks forward to its 2010 Congress in Nagasaki, Japan, and its 2014 Congress in Cape Town, South Africa, UNI has set goals for itself and its unions to increase union density and union power around the world.



UNI has an imaginative new strategic working plan with a dedicated organising and campaigning department that will provide strong support for organising work at targeted multinationals. This department will help build the capacity of existing union members plus foster the formation of new unions in countries where there are none.



UNI will have a dedicated organising fund that will be used to achieve real gains in union membership in all of its sectors.



The far-sighted and innovative plan strengthen the global union movement.



“We believe that empowering workers and building unions is the only way forward,” said UNI General Secretary Philip Jennings. “The financial crisis has been devastating for workers around the world. Workers can have a voice through their unions, and UNI gives them a voice at the global level. We want to make sure that every worker’s voice is heard and we believe the best way to do that is through unions.”



The management committee has agreed that UNI will keep turning up heat on private equity and hedge funds and continue its work for financial reform. UNI will also look into so-called “vulture funds,” which buy up distressed debt and look to turn a profit on reselling or restructuring debtor companies with little regards to the rights or livlihoods of workers.



Ahead of the Nagasaki Congress in November, 2010, UNI is joining a peace initiative started by Japanese trade union center Rengo and its members. The goal is to get 10 million signatures on a petition addressed to United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon that calls for the abolition of the world nuclear arsenal and eternal peace. The UN will hold a conference in New York in May 2010 on the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.



UNI is also well on its way to its target of signing 50 global agreements with multinationals before the Nagasaki Congress.





UNI President Joe Hansen said he is delighted to see UNI is increasing its capacity to build on its objectives for organizing and signing global agreements.