Historic Milestone: ILO Sets First Gig Work Standards

The International Labour Organization has adopted its first binding standards for gig platforms, impacting sectors like ride-hailing, food delivery, and e-commerce. The convention aims to extend core labor rights such as pay, safety, and social protections to gig workers, with distinctions between self-employed and employee status. It also mandates transparency in automated systems used by platforms.

In a landmark move, the International Labour Organization (ILO) has adopted its first binding standards targeting gig economy platforms including those for ride-hailing, food delivery, and e-commerce. This week, the ILO saw an overwhelming majority of 406 members vote in favor of the new regulations, with only eight against and 36 abstentions.

The agreed-upon convention seeks to extend crucial labor rights and protections—such as fair pay, safety measures, and social protections—to gig workers. Nonetheless, these protections are contingent upon whether workers are deemed self-employed or categorized as employees, thus signaling an important step in differentiating work classifications.

Importantly, the ILO convention demands transparency from platforms on how automated systems impact workers, ensuring human oversight in significant decisions like account deactivations. This regulation is expected to uphold labor rights while offering workers more clarity and control over their working conditions.