Hellish Heat: Iraqi workers trapped in a climate-labor crisis

Shafaq News

24-07-2025

Shafaq News
As temperatures in Iraq routinely soar above 50°C during the summer months, a silent humanitarian crisis is playing out in the country's bakeries, fish markets, and traditional kitchens.
Far from air-conditioned offices or shaded infrastructure, thousands of informal and daily-wage workers are enduring prolonged exposure to life-threatening heat—without protective regulation, legal enforcement, or viable alternatives.
This environmental-labor emergency is considered a chronic public health and governance failure, exacerbated by climate change and the state's inability to protect its most vulnerable citizens.
Iraq's Escalating Climate Extremes
Iraq is already one of the most climate-vulnerable countries in the world. In 2025, Baghdad and other provinces recorded several consecutive days between 48-50°C, and the Iraq Meteorological Organization forecasts longer and more intense heatwaves in the coming months.
According to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), Iraq is facing 'a critical convergence of rising temperatures, declining water availability, and growing urban vulnerability.' The country's urban centers—already burdened by poor infrastructure and weak public health services—are especially ill-equipped to handle prolonged extreme heat events.
The problem is not simply environmental, but systemic: climate change is interacting with weak labor protections and economic precarity to create conditions of extreme risk for Iraq's working class.
Health Hazards in Iraq's 'Indoor Outdoors'
Despite the assumption that extreme heat is primarily a concern for outdoor laborers, indoor workers in unventilated, fire-adjacent environments face a parallel—and often more intense—threat. In kitchens, bakeries, and grill stations, workers labor directly beside open flames and gas-powered ovens, often for 12-hour shifts.
'The sun is not our problem—the fire is,' said fish griller Hossam al-Din Abbas, explaining to Shafaq News that heat exposure is not only constant but intensified by the close-range proximity to high-temperature cooking stations. 'Halting work during dangerous heat is entirely up to employers. If we stop, we don't eat.'
'I've been doing this for 15 years. Every summer it gets worse. I've passed out, burned myself more times than I can count,' said bakery worker Kareem Farhan. 'We stand facing the fire for seven, sometimes ten hours straight. I've had to take weeks off because my body gave out—but I come back, because I need the job.'
'Many workers quit during the summer. It's just too much. But I've gotten used to it,' Farhan added. 'Used to being sick. Used to being tired. It's survival.'
Medical professionals have verified these hazards, warning that prolonged heat exposure without ventilation causes circulatory strain, joint inflammation, muscle cramps, and chronic fatigue.
The World Health Organization (WHO) confirms that occupational heat stress can lead to 'serious health outcomes, including cardiovascular and kidney diseases, especially when combined with poor air quality and lack of rest periods.'
Yet in Iraq, these risks are normalized. Workers return to stifling stations day after day, often without contracts, health insurance, or even access to basic first aid.
Legal Protections on Paper, Not in Practice
Iraq's 2015 Labor Law technically mandates essential safety provisions: proper gear, medical checks, and visible health instructions. But enforcement is virtually nonexistent, particularly in the sprawling informal sector, where inspections are rare and employment terms are unregulated.
Legal expert Nour al-Din Mahdi confirmed to Shafaq News that the absence of institutional oversight allows employers to 'violate basic safety requirements with impunity.'
'The Labor Law includes clear instructions for providing first-aid kits, protective gear, and regular health check-ups,' he added. 'But without inspections or penalties, these laws mean nothing in the informal sector.'
Restaurant owner Abdulaziz Abdelwahid told Shafaq News that closing during summer isn't feasible when the business is the only livelihood. 'Injuries and resignations happen, but we can't stop—this is how we feed our families.'
In essence, employers and employees alike are trapped in a mutual vulnerability: owners can't afford to close, and workers can't afford to stop—leaving no room for safety, even as conditions become lethal.
Culture of Silence
One of the most troubling dynamics is the near-total absence of complaints. Despite widespread suffering, no formal reports have been submitted by bakery or grill workers to Iraq's General Federation of Trade Unions.
According to the union representative, Sattar al-Danbous, the federation has received no formal reports from bakery or grill workers, even during peak heat.
'This silence reflects not acceptance but fear—of losing jobs, of being uninsured, and of institutions that workers don't trust to protect them. Many simply view suffering as part of survival.'
For many, physical harm becomes part of the job—baked into a labor culture where enduring risk is the price of economic survival.
No Heat Limits, No Central Authority
Across the Gulf, countries like the UAE, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia have implemented mandatory midday breaks or outright bans on outdoor labor during peak summer hours. These policies are informed by rising global awareness of occupational heat stress as a health hazard and economic risk.
In contrast, Iraq has no such laws. There is no national heat index system, no binding protocol for temperature-based work stoppages, and no centralized body responsible for monitoring thermal conditions in workplaces.
Labor unions occasionally issue safety advisories, but without inspections or consequences, most recommendations go ignored.
The International Labour Organization (ILO) has warned that without regulatory frameworks to protect against heat exposure, countries in the Middle East face 'increased rates of occupational illness, productivity losses, and premature mortality.'
The Intersection of Climate, Poverty, and Neglect
At its core, this crisis is not only about temperature. It is about inequality, deregulation, and environmental neglect. The state's failure to prepare for and respond to climate-induced labor risks is not an oversight—it is a structural issue deeply tied to Iraq's broader challenges: unstable governance, weakened public institutions, and reliance on an informal economy that employs over 60% of the workforce.
Climate change has not created this vulnerability, but it has exposed and magnified it.
If Iraq continues on this trajectory—without national heat standards, without enforcement of labor laws, and adaptation plans—the human toll will grow exponentially.
Climate scientists warn that Iraq's average summer temperatures may rise by 2–3°C by 2050, making current conditions not an anomaly—but a baseline.
Written and edited by Shafaq News staff.