[digital.global] im Dialog

Limits and opportunities of competition law in protecting gig workers – part five of the Policy Roundtable Series.

Our Gig Economy Initiative hosted another event in the Gig Economy Webinar Series. The fifth roundtable on July 26 focused on the intersection of antitrust laws and digital labor platforms on the African continent.

Concerns about working conditions on digital labor platforms have recently led to numerous protests, while the increasing market dominance of certain platforms results in economic dependency of workers that makes them vulnerable to exploitation. If the rapid growth of these digital labor platforms initially presents opportunities for the continent, the question is what impact this will have on future innovation, market entry, and access to good jobs in the African market in the absence of regulation.

The event brought together experts from across the continent to explore the characteristics of the existing digital labor platform market, the impact of the dominant platform players , and the competitive challenges posed by the current system.

Speakers:

• Maria-José Schmidt-Kessen, Assistant Professor, CEU
• Bonnita Nyamwire, Head of Research, Pollicy Uganda
• Florence Abebe, Chief Legal Officer, Federal Competition
  & Consumer Protection Commission Authority Nigeria

Moderator:

• Vellah Kigwiru, Doctoral Fellow, Hochschule für Politik, TUM

The event served as a valuable complement to the competition module authored by Vellah Kigwiru, which is part of our comprehensive 8-module online course, The Rise and Economics of Digital Labor Platforms, on the rise and economics of digital labor platforms.

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As part of the atingi ecosystem, the atingi4Ag project in Benin developed an open-source Interactive Voice Response (IVR) solution to make digital learning more accessible and inclusive. Working with three local farmers’ associations, the Benin Ministry of Digitalization, and the Benin Ministry of Agriculture, the team developed a training solution to deliver learning content to 90,000 farmers and small businesses, accessible through basic cell phones or smartphones. In addition to developing the technical solution, the project partnered with local telecommunications provider Moov Africa to provide SIM cards and discounted rates for calls to the Interactive Voice Response (IVR) courses. The IVR learning campaign was launched and handed over to partners on July 21, 2023 at the Moov Africa conference room in Cotonou, Benin.

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On July 20, the Fairwork report: “Work in the Planetary Labour Market: Fairwork Cloudwork Ratings 2023” was released. The study evaluates and grades basic fairness standards in labor agreements on 15 web-based digital labour platforms according to the five Fairwork principles:
Fair pay, conditions, contracts, management, and representation.

This year’s scores show that platforms are still far from safeguarding the basic standards of fair work expressed in these five principles. The research has revealed the precarious conditions for workers active in microwork platforms that provide services such as data annotation and labelling, video scoring and model evaluation to artificial intelligence (AI) companies. While the run for AI deployments gets public hype and momentum, workers behind the design, building and testing of these technological solutions, unfortunately, still face enormous challenges and experience unfair working conditions.

The launch event explored the key findings of the report in more depth, highlighted the implications for workers and the digital economy, and discussed the way forward to achieve minimum standards for fair work in the platform-based labor market. Prof. Mark Graham, Director of Fairwork and the lead researcher of the report, Dr. Jonas Valente presented the key findings.

Speakers:

• Dr Janine Berg, Senior Economist, International Labour Organization
• Esther Gathigi-Kibugi, Country Director, DOT Kenya

The full report can be viewed here.

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In the workshop, representatives of the BMZ, BMAS and BMWK developed a joint narrative on the priority areas of sustainability/transformation and health. The goals of the workshop were networking and exchange among those responsible for the measures as well as the identification of cooperation potentials.

The third EU-CELAC Summit took place in Brussels on July 17 and 18, 2023. Under the motto “Renewing the bi-regional partnership to strengthen peace and sustainable development”, the summit brought together heads of state and government from Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean to renew and strengthen relations between the two regions.

In preparation, the EU-LAC International Foundation was organizing several thematic EU-LAC forums aimed at bringing together relevant social actors, policy makers and institutions to discuss challenges and opportunities for the strategic partnership between the EU and Latin America/Caribbean.

On July 14, a virtual panel discussion on Twin Transition in Latin America and the Caribbean – Youth and Women’s Perspectives on Green and Digital Transformation was held in advance of the Summit.

Panel Discussion has included:

• Insight into the perspectives of women and youth on inclusion in the digital green transformation.
• Appreciation of the commitment of the EU and partners in EU member states to collaborate and use digital innovation to address global challenges, including the climate crisis
• Opportunity for innovators from the Latin American and Caribbean region, especially women, youth, and marginalized communities, to present their idea at an international competition and receive support for its implementation, in the region and globally.
• Focusing on women, youth and marginalized communities, innovators* from Latin America and the Caribbean will be offered the opportunity to present their ideas for an international competition, gaining support for potential scale-up at regional and global levels.

In collaboration with the partners of the [digital.global] networks D4D Hub and Expertise France GIZ supported MCTEN in the implementation of the first awareness workshop on “Artificial Intelligence for actors in the digital ecosystem in Senegal”. The goal of this initiative is to agree on an AI roadmap to boost the Senegalese economy.

The AGYLE Digital Event, which was implemented on behalf of BMZ by AWE and Germany Land of Ideas brought together experts and young leaders from Africa and Germany on July 11, 2023. Under this year’s motto “Digital transformation – how young leaders are shaping a green and inclusive future”, Martin Wimmer, CDO, provided insights into the BMZ’s perspective.

On July 03, 2023, Fairwork launched the first global report on gender and platform work. The research of the report “Gender and Platform Work” covers a period of four years in 38 countries. More than 180 platforms were considered and interviews were conducted with more than 5,000 platform workers. The report concludes that common practices in the platform economy, such as non-payment of a living wage, unsafe working conditions, and inadequate responses to gender discrimination, are associated with the risks of widening the gender wage gap, lowering labor force participation, and perpetuating gender inequalities.

Keynote 1:

• Noémi Bürkl, Head of the Unit Digitalisation, BMZ

Keynote 2:

• Dr Uma Rani, Senior Economist, ILO

Panel:

• Dr Kavita Dattani, Oxford Internet Institute
• Tanja Jakobi, Fairwork Serbia
• Dr Anjali Krishan, Oxford Internet Institute
• Dr Cheryll Soriano, Fairwork Philippines
• Prof Janaki Srinivasan, Fairwork India

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The closing event of the DPG-Charter celebrated the collaboration of over 100 professionals from 67 organizations and more than 30 countries. Charter signatories included partners of the [digital.global] network such as USAID, UNDP, DIAL and DPGA.

Over 40 million people use digital work platforms as their main or secondary source of income. The platform economy offers promising advantages such as flexibility, low barriers to entry, and access to key digital infrastructure, making it an attractive labor market for skilled professionals. Many of these individuals rely on formal or informal training to acquire basic skills and competencies that they can then use as valuable assets in the digital economy.

The rapid pace of technological advancement and growing competition require constant updating and upgrading of skills for both learners and gigworkers. For platform-based gigworkers, microcredentials offer a convenient way to further their education and showcase their expertise on digital platforms and to potential clients. Microcredentials, much like the gig economy, represent a notable shift in the labor and education market by providing shorter, digital, and easily accessible opportunities.

GIZ commissioned a research sprint on behalf of BMZ to explore the value of microcredentials in the context of the digital work economy, as well as their benefits for skilled gigworkers and the value they create for current and future learners in vocational education.

In this webinar, key findings from the research sprint were shared and the web-based tool for TVET learners/gig workers on microcredentials was introduced. In addition, experts in Kenya, India, and Asia-Pacific shared their experiences with Microcredentials and for the Gig Economy. More info on the Gig Economy can be found here.

At this cooperation event of AWE with IHK Karlsruhe and LAV on the topic “Latin America – new markets – new needs: AI and Digital Innovation as a Common Approach in Cooperation”, Corinna Peters, Consultant for Digitalization at AWE, presented the offers of the [digital.global] network.

On the initiative of the BDI and with the support of LiveEO, the NewSpace Breakfast discussed the rapid developments in the African space market. Dirk Meyer, Head of Division, Global Health, Economy, Trade and Rural Development, BMZ, gave a keynote speech on the growing importance of satellite technologies in development cooperation.

On June 20th 2023 from 11:00am – 12:30pm CEST, the Members of Parliament Armand Zorn (Social Democrats) and Tobias Bacherle (Greens) together with the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) are hosting an online webinar on “The necessity of value-driven regulations for a fair digital transformation”.

This webinar was the last session of the webinar series on digitalization in development cooperation and participants were invited to share their expertise and perspective in the discussion with the Members of Parliament, the Parliamentary State Secretary at the BMZ, Dr. Bärbel Kofler, as well as anticipated international expert panelists such as Alison Gillwald (CEO, Research ICT Africa), a representative from Smart Africa and local governmental partners.

Together, the opportunities of regulations for a fair digital transformation and the need for harmonized, value-based international regulations were discussed. It also explored the extent to which the EU’s regulatory approaches are relevant and adaptable for countries in the Global South, while conversely we seek to learn from the regulatory approaches of our partner countries in the Global South.