WASHINGTON, DC – The U.S. Department of Labor announced today the availability of $7 million in grant funding to combat child and forced labor abuses in Mexico’s chile pepper and tomato industries.

WASHINGTON, DC – Senior officials of the U.S. Department of Labor and the Mexican Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare met this week in Mexico City to discuss the challenges, opportunities and commitments needed to advance the implementation of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement.

WASHINGTON, DC – U.S. Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh and Ambassador of Mexico to the United States Esteban Moctezuma led a ceremony today to renew collaboration agreements between the Government of Mexico and the Government of the United States, for the protection of the rights of Mexican workers in this country.

WASHINGTON, DC – The U.S. Department of Labor today announced the availability of up to $10 million in grant funding to advance labor compliance in the Mexican states of Nuevo Leon, Sonora and Baja California, consistent with the obligations of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement.

WASHINGTON, DC – On Aug. 18, workers at the General Motors’ Silao plant in Mexico voted to reject a proposed collective bargaining agreement, an action heralded as a win for the labor protections built into the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement.

WASHINGTON, DC – The U.S. Department of Labor today announced the availability of up to $5 million in grant funding to improve workers’ ability to exercise their labor rights in the agricultural supply chains in Guatemala and Honduras and the textile/apparel – or maquila – sector of El Salvador.

WASHINGTON, DC – The U.S. Department of Labor today announced the availability of up to $5 million in grant funding aimed at strengthening decent work for laborers in South America’s fishing industries.

WASHINGTON, DC – The U.S. Department of Labor today announced its intent to award up to $10 million in grant funding to improve gender equity in the Mexican workplace.

WASHINGTON, DC – The U.S. Department of Labor today announced its intent to award approximately $8 million for a technical assistance project to improve workplace safety and health conditions in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, and provide workers greater access to social protection.

WASHINGTON, DC – The U.S. Department of Labor today announced its intent to award up to $20 million in grant funding to elevate workers’ rights and improve working conditions in the Central American countries of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras.

WASHINGTON, DC – The U.S. Department of Labor today announced the availability of $10 million in grant funding to improve the resolution of labor disputes in Mexico. The project seeks to increase the effectiveness of conciliation mechanisms to resolve labor disputes in support of Mexico’s 2019 landmark labor reform.

WASHINGTON, DC – The U.S. Department of Labor today announced the availability of $3 million in grant funding to support progress on labor standards, including occupational safety and health, hours of work and wages in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. 

WASHINGTON, DC – In collaboration with the U.S. Department of State, the U.S. Department of the Treasury, the U.S. Department of Commerce, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, the U.S. Department of Labor today issued an updated Xinjiang Supply Chain Business Advisory.

WASHINGTON, DC – On Thursday, July 8, the U.S. and Mexico announced a comprehensive plan to ensure that international labor standards are being enforced at the General Motors’ facility in Silao, Mexico. This effort represents the first step of remediation under the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement. Through this type of enforcement, American workers are protected from unfair trade practices and are able to compete and succeed in the manufacturing sector.

WASHINGTON, DC – The U.S. Department of Labor and the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative met with their counterparts in the Mexican and Canadian governments June 29 for the first meeting of the Labor Council as established under the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement.

WASHINGTON, DC – Every two years, the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of International Labor Affairs publishes its “List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor” that the bureau has reason to believe are produced by child labor or forced labor in violation of international standards, as directed by the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2005 and subsequent reauthorizations.

WASHINGTON, DC – U.S. Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh announced the joint winners of the 2021 Iqbal Masih Award for the Elimination of Child Labor during a virtual ceremony.

WASHINGTON, DC – A young Ethiopian girl dreamt of finishing school to become a health worker in her village. She was 13 when her father died, forcing her to leave school and enter the fields to pick coffee to help her family. During long days of work, she harvests, washes and sorts coffee cherries – exposed to sharp objects, pesticides and other hazardous chemicals – with her health and her future at risk.

WASHINGTON, DC – A boy toils long hours lugging mica from deep underground mines to the surface above and then sorts and processes the mineral. With no protection from razor sharp tools, the child’s work exposes him fully to the mica and sand dust kicked up in the mining and sorting processes. At the end of the supply chain, the mined and processed mica finds its way into the manufacture of many consumer products such as automobiles, cosmetics and electronics.

WASHINGTON, DC – Under a hot sun, a child wields a machete at work in the fields, forced to inhale pesticides sprayed by adults eager to maintain their cocoa crop. Sadly, it is a reality for too many children, particularly those at work in Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana’s cocoa industries.