The Cipriani College of Labour and Co-operative Studies has signed an agreement with the Caribbean Development Bank to do a study of workplace practices in 15 of the bank's member states.

In a release on Thursday, the CCLCS said the exercise to gather data on workplace issues will be the first of its kind in the Caribbean. It will focus on equity and fairness, worker representation, employment security, and labour administration.

"It will fill a critical gap in understanding the dynamics of the Caribbean working environment and facilitate the design of policies that would support social and economic development. The research project will allow for both country-specific and regional analysis of world of work dynamics," the CCLCS said.

CCLCS director Dr Andre Vincent Henry, in the release, said, “Too often researchers and policy makers are attempting to respond to the real challenges of Caribbean development in the world of work and find themselves having to make inferences based on data sets that are either from regions unrelated to the Caribbean or data sets that combine the Caribbean with Latin America, neither of which is satisfactory, given the uniqueness of this region.”

The CCLCS said changes in regional policies and practices are necessary as the Caribbean deals with environmental and social changes.

"As the Caribbean is forced to anticipate, confront and respond to natural and human-caused disruptions, a shift in knowledge, policy, and practice is urgently needed and the focus on people, planet, and prosperity has never been more relevant. It is important to ensure equal and sustainable access to resources by disadvantaged, vulnerable and often disenfranchised groups as a key feature of this renewed focus. The research is expected to make a contribution to the objective of development based on social justice," it said.

A survey of more than 3,000 respondents in 15 of the CDB's member states is part of the multi-method research project. It will include focus groups of workers (men and women), representatives from the social and solidarity economy and from the private sector. It will also involve in-depth key informant interviews.

The first data set from the research is expected be available in the first quarter of 2024.

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