"Iraqi builders face growing risks on frontline of climate change"

With temperatures that can go above 50C (122F), Iraqi building sites have long been a hazardous place to work in summer. Labourers grapple with bricks that are too hot to touch and tiles that can burn. Some faint and fall from buildings.

The risks are growing in a country which the United Nations has identified as the fifth-most vulnerable to climate change, prompting calls for a rethink of work practices and better safeguards - in construction and more widely...

Other countries in the region, notably Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, have long enforced a mid-day break from work in direct sunlight from around noon till 3 p.m.

Critics say Iraq has few if any such protections, and loosely enforces such regulations as do exist. Many workers are hired informally, leaving them with few legal safeguards.

Nasir Ali Hussein, associate director of inspection at the Labour Ministry, said Iraq had no regulations specific to heat and could explore updating its legal framework. But he noted that the law requires employers to broadly ensure worker safety....

While the authorities in Basra ordered public-sector workers to stay home recently when temperatures climbed above 50C, work continued at the building site where [Sajad al-Zami, construction worker] is employed.

Maha Kattaa, the International Labor Organization (ILO) representative in Iraq, said the authorities needed to strengthen both heat-related regulations and oversight to keep workers safe.

Iraq recorded around 4,000 work-related injuries in 2022, she said, citing labour ministry data. But this was likely a significant undercount and it was unclear how many were related to heat, she said...