Labouring through the Climate Crisis: A Qualitative Study of Climate Experiences among Informal Workers in Delhi

About 80 per cent of Delhi's workers work in the informal sector; around 82 per cent of men and 76 per cent of women are employed informally. The city has over 400,000 street vendors, around 200,000 waste pickers, around 500,000 domestic workers, and around 500,000 rickshaw pullers, many of whom work without formal worker status or social and legal protections.

In 2024, India experienced one of its hottest summers in 14 years, with the country recording 536 heatwave days in total across the country. Temperatures rose as high as 50.5°C in Rajasthan, marking the peak for the season and over 700 people lost their lives to heatstroke from March to June 2024 across 17 states.

From 2001 to 2020, India lost approximately 259 billion work hours annually due to climate impacts. Of those, extreme heat accounted for approximately 181 billion lost hours, with particularly devastating effects on informal workers who are usually employed outside in all conditions with minimal protection.

A 2023 study conducted in Delhi found that with every degree Celsius rise in temperature, there was a 19 per cent drop in take-home pay of informal workers, sometimes with earnings falling by as much as 40 per cent when heatwaves occurred. The same workers saw their medical costs rise by 14 per cent with every degree rise in temperature.

The International Labour Organisation estimates that over 34 million full-time jobs will be lost in India by 2030 due to climate change. The largest proportion of losses will affect informal workers.

Daily income of the surveyed street vendors fluctuated wildly, the study notes. It dropped to Rs. 300 on bad days and reaching Rs. 1,200 on better days. But the vendors continued to pay around Rs. 100 daily in bribes and under-the-table fees, around Rs. 400 for transportation, and over Rs. 6,000 rupees monthly in various fees.

Authorities have shut down garbage collection sites, forcing women who collect waste to store the sorted recyclables in their ill-ventilated homes for long periods of time. This sorted waste becomes hazardous material, putting the waste pickers at risk from toxic gases, chemicals and infections.

Domestic workers have to work in kitchens that have poor air circulation and offer no relief from inclement weather. They also cannot take breaks because to stop working means not making money and possibly losing their jobs altogether. The study also notes that forced eviction drives and development schemes in cities have shifted domestic workers further and further away from the centre of town, lengthening their travel and furthering exhaustion.

Most rickshaw pullers in Delhi are migrant workers from Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, and West Bengal, the study notes. They have to pay the daily rickshaw rental fees which can range anywhere from Rs. 200 to 250 regardless of how much they earn. In summers, drinking water itself accounts for a major portion of their expenditure, at two rupees per glass, with twenty to thirty glasses being consumed by each worker every day. Toilets, too, are paid for.

Street vendors are now being exposed to extreme heat that begins earlier in the year and continues for longer stretches. Lacking either shaded selling locations or official work areas, they are required to stand in direct sunlight for hours on end, causing headaches, dizziness, and even unconsciousness.

Most vendors deliberately limit the amount of water they drink during their working time, due to a lack of available, safe, and operational public toilets to use. This involuntary dehydration, in turn, causes widespread urinary tract infections, kidney stones, and chronic fatigue, especially in women. With the coming of monsoon rains, continuously wearing soaked shoes increases the occurrence of joint pain, skin infections, and problems with blood circulation.

Waste pickers often live and work around hazardous sites like landfills, without protective gear. They are constantly exposed to decaying waste which emits potent fumes, releasing methane and other toxic compounds into the air. Hospital waste, often dumped without precautions, gets combined with regular trash, increasing waste pickers' risk of infections and skin diseases.

Surveyed rickshaw pullers responded saying they reduce their working hours as heat intensifies. Fluid loss, heat-related collapse, elevated blood pressure, and breathing difficulties are prevalent among these workers. Conversely in winter, lacking protective clothing and warm spaces, many are forced to set fire to waste materials to keep themselves warm, inhaling toxic smoke, which further damages their health.

Groups such as the National Hawker Federation and Janpahal serve an important role in organising vendors, providing legal support, and advocating on behalf of their interests with city governments. Groups like Safai Sena, CHINTAN, and the Basti Suraksha Manch in Delhi have organised waste pickers in their fight to access identity documents, protection equipment, and inclusion in municipal waste management systems. For domestic workers, groups like the National Domestic Workers' Movement, SEWA Delhi and Jagori have worked in Delhi to organise workers, demand legal protections, and intervene in cases of workplace violence.

Rickshaw pullers, on the other hand, are seriously constrained in developing collective strength owing to a weak union presence. Because they do not have organised groups, rickshaw pullers have scant opportunities to learn about legal protections, city transport policies, or worker rights, let alone link these issues to disruptions caused by climate change.

Focus and Factoids by Arnabi Mallick.

PARI Library's health archive project is part of an initiative supported by the Azim Premji University to develop a free-access repository of health-related reports relevant to rural India.