Juan Somavía Altamirano is the former Director-General of the International Labour Organization (ILO).
He was elected to serve as the ninth Director-General of the ILO by the Governing Body on 23 March 1998. On 7 November 2013, he was appointed by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to serve as Special Adviser on Interregional Policy Cooperation.
Juan Somavía
International Labour Organization
The International Labour Organization (ILO) is a United Nations agency whose mandate is to advance social and economic justice by setting international labour standards. Founded in October 1919 under the League of Nations, it is one of the first and oldest specialised agencies of the UN. The ILO has 187 member states: 186 out of 193 UN member states plus the Cook Islands. It is headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, with around 40 field offices around the world, and employs some 3,381 staff across 107 nations, of whom 1,698 work in technical cooperation programmes and projects.
ILO headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland
International Labour Organization flag
Samuel Gompers (right) with Albert Thomas, 1918
Greenwood, Ernest H. (of the United States – Deputy secretary general of the conference) / Secretary General: Harold B. Butler (Great Britain) / Deputy Secretaries General: Ernest H. Greenwood (United States) / Guido Pardo (Italy) /Legal Adviser: Manley 0. Hudson (United States) / with staff of the first International Labour Conference, in Washington, D.C., in 1919, in front of the Pan American Union Building
