THE COMMISSION OF THE ANDEAN COMMUNITY,

HAVING SEEN: Article 44 of the Cartagena Agreement and Decision 188 of the Andean Community Commission;

WHEREAS: The Guidelines laid down by the Andean Presidential Council seek greater labor participation in the construction of the process of integration geared toward creating a common market;

DECIDES:

Article 1.- The Andean Labor Advisory Council, as stipulated in Article 44 of the Cartagena Agreement, is a consultative institution belonging to the Andean Integration System, whose function is to express its opinion to the Andean Council of Foreign Ministers, the Commission, or the General Secretariat, at the request of the latter or on its own initiative, with regard to programs or activities of the Andean Subregional integration process that fall within its area of interest.

Article 2.- The Council is made up of four (4) delegates from each Member Country. Those delegates and their alternates will be elected from among the top-level leaders of the representative labor organizations designated by each Member Country.

Article 3.- The Council shall have the following functions:

1. To express its opinion to the Andean Council of Foreign Ministers, the Commission, or the General Secretariat, as stipulated in article 1 of this Decision;
2. To attend meetings of governmental experts or working groups having to do with labor activities, to which it is invited by decision of the Member Countries; and
3. To participate, with a right to voice its opinion, at meetings of the Andean Council of Foreign Ministers and of the Commission of the Andean Community.

Article 4.- The opinions and agreements of the Council shall be recorded in minutes.

The General Secretariat shall place on record in the preambular part of the proposals it submits to the Commission, any initiatives presented by the Andean Labor Advisory Council.

Article 5.- For the purposes stipulated in article 2 of this Decision, the National Integration Organizations shall summon their various labor organizations to decide upon the mechanism for designating their representatives to the Council and so that they may accordingly proceed to choose those representatives.

The designation of representatives by the labor organizations shall be for a one-year period and must be officially authenticated with the Andean Community General Secretariat by the National Integration Organizations.

Article 6.- In the bodies where its participation is envisaged, the Council shall be represented by its Chairman and, in the event of his or her absence or impediment, by its Vice-Chairman or the Council Member delegated to represent it, appointed according to the Council’s rules of procedure. The chairmanship shall be held for a one-year period, to be followed in the order of priority established for the other Andean Integration System bodies.

Article 7.- Let Decision 188 be repealed. 

Signed in the city of Cartagena de Indias, Colombia, on the twenty-sixth of July of nineteen ninety-eight.