Ridwan Max Sijabat, Jakarta – A recent study conducted by the Asian Labor Network on International Financial Institution (ALNI) has shown that a number of ongoing projects financed by the World Bank in Bali, infringe on core labor standards.

The ALNI's research team – which distributed questionnaires to around 200 employees of the projects – found that workers were working seven hours to ten hours a day, seven days a week, without the required safety equipment and social security insurance.

Timboel Siregar, a team member who presented the research results here over the weekend, said the study found that seven child workers and many women workers received less pay than male workers whose duties were the same.

They live in camps that are not up to standard, particularly when it rains or at night. "Some 90 percent of the workers are not employed on a permanent basis but paid on a daily basis. If compared to the daily minimum wage in the province, the workers' salaries, which range from Rp 10,000 to Rp 40,000 a day, are very low," he said.

He added that workers employed in the Bali Urban Infrastructure Project (BUIP) had been deprived of core labor standards as they had depended upon local brokers, who recruited them without bargaining for better conditions. The projects, worth US$74 million in total, have been underway since May 1997. They comprise the construction of a bridge and two drainages in Ubud, the widening of a road in Bedugul, the renovation of a monument within a reserve in Gilimanuk and the development of a camping ground and roadwork in Gianyar. The projects are managed by PT Dacrea but subcontracted to numerous local companies, including PT Adi Murti, PT AKAS and PT Slipi Raya Utama.

Timboel said the two World Bank project officers in Indonesia had not closely supervised the labor conditions of projects that it had funded in the country.

The World Bank, which observed its 60th anniversary on July 21, has financed numerous development projects to help alleviate poverty in Indonesia.

Boni Setiawan of the Global Justice Institute (IGJ) said the World Bank had principally been aware of core labor standards but had not directly supervised the development projects.

"The World Bank has not been strict about labor standards. The government lacks the political will to respect workers' basic rights and its labor policy is employer-oriented," he said, citing that the World Bank had financed thousands of development projects in the country since the 1970s.

Rudy Porter, country director of the American Center for International Labor Solidarity (ACILS), also regretted the poor labor conditions that were apparent in the World Bank-funded Bali development projects, saying that countries behind the World Bank should pay special attention to the issue.

"The World Bank should reflect its (founding) countries' strong commitment to International Labor Organization conventions and core labor standards on people's right to work, equal payment and the eradication of child labor," he said, when asked to comment on ALNI's research.

The World Bank's office in Jakarta has accepted the report on labor abuse in the BUIP, saying this could be a starting point to prevent such incidents in its other development projects.

"Having read the ALNI research, we are concerned by these findings, and we will take the information very seriously... We strongly believe that the objectives of the ALNI's research are positive, and we would like to learn from its findings. It is from initiatives like these that our institution could gain more insight for future improvements," World Bank spokesman Mohamad Al-Arief told The Jakarta Post on Monday.

Al-Arief explained that the World Bank had actually sent a warning letter to all firms involved in the projects and urged the (Indonesian) government to take stern action over the child labor issue.