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Paper short abstract:

This framework explores the social, political, and environmental determinants of informal workers’ health and livelihoods by synthesising our key findings from Zimbabwe and India. We highlight the need to analyse multi-level factors shaping informal livelihoods, including climate change.

Paper long abstract:

Informal workers’ health and livelihoods are often rooted in multi-level social, environmental, and political factors that remain poorly understood. Key cross-cutting factors may include official regulations and enforcement (or lack thereof); migration patterns; global economic transformations; and zoonotic diseases (as illustrated by COVID-19). We argue that climate change represents another far-reaching determinant of informal workers’ health, well-being, and livelihoods. In this presentation, we offer a new framework exploring how climate change as well as other environmental, socioeconomic, and political factors (across scales) jointly affect informal workers’ health.

This presentation will synthesise major findings on how climate change intersects with other risks facing informal workers, based on recent research in Harare, Masvingo (Zimbabwe), and Indore (India). Heatwaves, drought, floods, and multiple sources of air pollution emerged as major threats to informal workers’ health. Informal workers often face difficult trade-offs, which reflect competing priorities and minimal social safety nets. We argue for additional qualitative data-collection and participatory action-research, which can help co-produce solutions with informal labourers and better address such complex challenges.

Additionally, we highlight opportunities for interventions with multiple benefits such as shelter upgrading; enhanced access to social protection; and clean energy at the home and workplace. Workplace WASH can foster gender equality and decent work, especially in the context of water scarcity and rising temperatures. Civil society organisations can mobilise informal workers and residents for better living and working conditions, while grassroots savings groups and microfinance agencies can support incremental upgrading to foster climate-resilient housing.