The Major Milestones for Development of Trade Unions in Tanzania: Is the Environment for the Operation Conducive?

Abstract

Trade unions are legally recognized as official organizations representing and protecting workers rights and interests. They have to struggle to ensure the improvement of living standards of employees. This can be achieved through trade unions consciousness and participation in government’s labour policies, member’s commitment, and strong leadership. However, trade unions require favoring environment for their participation and rising voices, especially when governments and policies are silent about workers’ rights or when workers benefits are at stake. This paper, for that matter, explores the major milestones for the development of trade unions in Tanzania since independence to present. It also assesses the conduciveness of environment for the operation of trade unions in Tanzania today. It is however, the opinion of this paper that, the environment for the operation of trade unions is still a mixture and not much favorable for the operation of trade unions.

Keywords: Environment, Milestones, Trade unions