GENEVA, Switzerland, Oct. 21 (UPI) -- The global financial turmoil may cause 20 million more people to lose their jobs around the world, the International Labor Organization warned in Switzerland.
"We need prompt and coordinated government actions to avert a social crisis that could be severe, long-lasting and global," warned Juan Somavia, director general of the U.N. agency in Geneva, an ILO news release said.
Using revised global growth estimates of the International Monetary Fund, the United Nations and early reports of job losses in many countries, Somavia said ILO's preliminary estimates showed the "number of unemployed could rise from 190 million in 2007 to 210 million in late 2009."
He said the number of working poor living on less than $1 a day could rise by some 40 million and those getting $2 a day by more than 100 million.
Somavia warned the financial crisis would the construction, automotive, tourism, finance, services and real estate sectors the hardest.
The latest estimates "could prove to be underestimates if the effects of the current economic contraction and looming recession are not quickly confronted," he said, adding what is needed is an economic rescue plan for working families and the real economy, with rules and policies that deliver decent jobs.
The latest IMF projection issued earlier this month calls for a projected 3.2 per cent global growth next year, down from 4.6 per cent for this year.
