INFORMAL ECONOMY IN INDIA AND TRADE UNION ACTIVITY

In 2016, the International Labour Organisation estimates that two billion people who are employed worldwide and
are 15 years of age or older work informally, accounting for 61.2% of all employment. 83% of the workforce in India
is employed by the unorganised sector, compared to 17% by the organised sector. Because the informal worker lacks
a variety of security measures, including employment security, job security, and work security, as well as because of
the rising informalization trend, which has moved jobs from categories where they could be collectively bargained to
ones where they cannot, the need for union protection in the informal workplace is crucial. However, one significant
disadvantage of informal employment is the lack of effective unionisation. Traditional trade unions around the world
have tried a number of strategies to organise these informal workers as part of the current structure. Traditional trade
unions struggle to organise informal workers due to a variety of problems and obstacles. Despite the difficulties
traditional trade unions have had organising the informal workforce, over the past few decades, these workers have
organised themselves in a variety of ways to strengthen their bargaining position, their economic standing, and their
standard of living. These consist of workers' associations such as trade unions, cooperatives, and others.The term
"Membership-Based Organisations" (MBOs) is used by members of the WIEGO network, allies, and partner
organisations to describe the variety of these organisations in the informal economy. In this paper, a few (MBOs) that
organise women who work in the informal sector in India are highlighted. The following sections make up the structure
of the paper: (1) An overview of the informal economy in India (2) Formal Trade Union and informal sector (3) The
difficulties unions face in organising workers in the informal sector (4) Organisational structures of membershipbased
organisations (5) MBOs operating in India (5) Conclusions.