ArcelorMittal steelworkers win higher pay in Algeria

ALGIERS: Some 7,000 workers at ArcelorMittal Annaba, the Algerian subsidiary of the multinational steel giant, have won a 15 per cent pay rise after a two-day strike, their spokesman said Wednesday.

"We obtained a rise of 15 per cent in the basic pay scale, and re-evaluation of some key jobs making up three per cent of the total pay roll, and we signed a company agreement with the management," Smain Kouadria said.

Some 7,200 workers at the northeastern steel plant in El Hadjar and at ArcelorMittal sales points in the country went on an indefinite strike on Monday, but returned to work late Tuesday in light of the deal.

ArcelorMittal management declined to comment on the accord. The pay increase will be a graduated one within a two-year time frame laid out in the collective bargaining agreement.

The El Hadjar plant lies near the coastal city of Annaba, some 600 kilometres (375 miles) east of Algiers.

Kouadria had on Tuesday said that negotiations were under way but stalled on the issue of the revised wage scale, but the new agreement took effect on Tuesday night.

The Algerian workers had demanded higher pay, improvements to their working conditions, particularly at the hot furnaces and in the steel rolling mills, and a re-evaluation of their family benefits and pensions.

Kouadria said Wednesday that the deal would benefit the company as well as the steel workers since it includes measures that will "have a positive impact on the return to work and productivity."

Both management and the union acknowledged that the global financial crisis and poor sales of steel products within Algeria had had an impact on the firm's activities, according to Kouadria.

ArcelorMittal faces competition from Italian and Spanish companies seeking their share of the Algerian market.

The El Hadjar complex, which formerly belonged to the Algerian state, was privatised in 2001, when Ispat, an Indian company in the Mittal group, took 70 per cent of the shares.