Author(s): Khyati Nayak
Trade and labour are inextricably interwoven, and as international trade has grown, so the number of Free Trade Agreements that include labour dimensions, either directly or indirectly through parallel agreements. According to findings of various reports of International Labour Organisation, the working conditions of labour in developing countries remain poor. These concerns regarding the same have increased by the rapid growth in the number of Regional and Free Trade Agreements around the globe. There has been a lot of discussion about including labour protections in trade treaties. Those who supports the inclusion of labour standards in FTAs often believe that these measures protect against the possible negative impacts of free trade while also preventing developing nations from decreasing their labour standards. Labour critics, on the other hand, think that these measures are protectionist in character and advantage developed nations that impose high labour standards on developing countries. In the recent past the labour rights provisions under India’s FTAs have deviated from international & domestic standards (WTO’s Regional Trade Agreements Information System (RTA-IS). This research paper explore the implications of the increase of free trade agreements (FTAs) in past years and the labour provisons under these FTAs. The paper also draw few suggestions on measures that can be taken for improving protection of individual and collective labour rights balancing along the trade interest of the state.