Georgia rebuilt labour inspection almost from nothing: abolished in 2006, the inspectorate has had a full mandate over labour rights and safety only since 2021. Its activity has grown fast. But Georgia has still not ratified the ILO’s Labour Inspection Convention, staffing data are out of date, and there is little independent evidence on whether violations are actually corrected.
Key Findings
- Georgia had no labour inspectorate from 2006 to 2015. The Labour Inspection Service has had a full mandate over labour rights, occupational safety and labour exploitation only since 1 January 2021 (Human Rights Watch, 2023; Council of Europe, 2023).
- Inspection activity has grown rapidly: about 4,050 inspections over the four years 2018–2021 combined, 3,529 in 2022 and 7,111 in 2025 (Council of Europe, 2023; ILO, 2023; Parliament of Georgia, 2026).
- Staff of the Labour Inspection Office, including inspectors, rose from 113 in 2021 to 167 at the end of 2022 (ILO, 2023). More recent staffing figures are not readily available, although the law requires them to be included in the annual report.
- Georgia has not ratified ILO Convention No. 81 on labour inspection. The European Commission’s 2024 report recommends ratification; the Ministry has started the ratification process (European Commission, 2024; ILO, 2023).
- The chief labour inspector is appointed and may be dismissed by the Minister (Law on the Labour Inspection Service, Article 7) — a design that places weight on the safeguards for inspectors’ independence required by Convention No. 81.
- The Service reports falling violations and a 46% fall in fatal workplace accidents in 2025, but independent evidence on whether violations are corrected remains limited (Parliament of Georgia, 2026; Civil Society Foundation, 2023).
1. From Abolition to Full Mandate
Georgia abolished its labour inspectorate in 2006 as part of a broad deregulation of labour law, and restored it in 2015 with powers limited to occupational safety (Human Rights Watch, 2023). The Organic Law on Occupational Safety, adopted in February 2019, allowed inspectors to enter all workplaces without a court order or prior notice, and introduced fines of GEL 100–50,000 and the power to suspend work in cases of severe violations (OC Media, 2019).
On 29 September 2020 Parliament adopted amendments to the Labour Code together with a new Law on the Labour Inspection Service. From 1 January 2021 the Service has supervised compliance with the Labour Code, the Law on Public Service, rules on forced labour and labour exploitation, and occupational safety norms, with sanctions ranging from a warning and a fine to suspension of work (Council of Europe, 2023).
2. Mandate and Powers
| Element | Provision | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Legal status | Legal entity under public law under the control of the Ministry responsible for labour | Law on the Labour Inspection Service |
| Leadership | Chief labour inspector appointed and may be dismissed by the Minister (Article 7) | Law on the Labour Inspection Service |
| Scope | Labour rights, occupational safety, forced labour and labour exploitation, public service employment; also labour migration and anti-discrimination oversight | Council of Europe (2023); Parliament of Georgia (2026) |
| Access | Inspectors may enter any workplace freely and without prior notice, at any time of day or night | European Committee of Social Rights (2023) |
| Sanctions | Warning, fine, suspension of the work process; safety fines of GEL 100–50,000 | Council of Europe (2023); OC Media (2019) |
| Reporting | Annual report to Parliament within six months of the year’s end, public, including staff numbers, inspection visits, violations and sanctions, accidents and occupational diseases (Article 10) | Law on the Labour Inspection Service |
3. Activity: Rapid Growth
The Service now carries out more inspections in a single year than in the four years 2018–2021 combined. According to the Labour Inspection Office’s 2022 report, there were 2,510 occupational safety inspections and 1,019 labour rights inspections that year (ILO, 2023). In 2025 the Service carried out 7,111 inspections, including first-time inspections of 3,709 facilities, 224 inspections on labour migration (with 62 administrative offence reports) and 233 on anti-discrimination (Parliament of Georgia, 2026).
Published figures are not always expressed in the same unit. For 2024 Parliament reported that 1,901 enterprises were inspected — 1,249 in planned and 652 in unplanned inspections (Parliament of Georgia, 2025). Because one enterprise may be inspected more than once, this figure cannot be compared directly with the number of inspections reported for 2022 or 2025.
4. Resources
Staff, including labour inspectors, rose from 113 in 2021 to 167 at the end of 2022, an increase of 48% (ILO, 2023). Georgia’s 2022 report under the European Social Charter stated that the office then had 90 labour inspectors (Council of Europe, 2023). GILS could not find a more recent published figure, although Article 10 of the Law on the Labour Inspection Service requires the annual report to state the number of employees.
The ILO does not set a single required ratio of inspectors to workers. Convention No. 81 requires the number of inspectors to be sufficient for the effective discharge of their duties, taking into account the number, nature and size of workplaces, the number of workers, and the complexity of the legal provisions to be enforced (ILO, 2022). With around 1.39 million people employed in Georgia in 2025 (Geostat, 2026) and a mandate that now covers both safety and labour rights, current and detailed staffing data are essential to judge whether resources match the task.
5. International Standards
Georgia has not ratified the Labour Inspection Convention, 1947 (No. 81), or the Labour Inspection (Agriculture) Convention, 1969 (No. 129) — the two governance conventions on labour inspection (ILO NORMLEX). Following regulatory impact assessments in 2022, the Ministry initiated tripartite discussions and the administrative process for ratifying Convention No. 81 (ILO, 2023).
The European Commission’s 2024 report on Georgia found “some level of preparation” in social policy and employment and “limited progress”, noting that the Labour Inspection Office’s capacity had been strengthened. It recommended that Georgia ratify and implement relevant ILO conventions, “in particular C081 on labour inspection” (European Commission, 2024).
| Requirement of Convention No. 81 | Georgia |
|---|---|
| Free entry to workplaces without prior notice (Article 12) | Provided in law |
| Annual report, published (Articles 20–21) | Required by law and heard by Parliament |
| Sufficient number of inspectors (Article 10) | Staff grew to 167 by end-2022; no current figure published |
| Status and conditions assuring inspectors’ independence from improper external influence (Article 6) | Chief inspector appointed and dismissible by the Minister; safeguards not assessed independently |
| Ratification of the Convention | Not ratified; process initiated |
Sources: ILO C081; Law on the Labour Inspection Service; European Committee of Social Rights (2023); ILO (2023). GILS assessment.
6. Effectiveness and Transparency
What the Service reports
Presenting the 2025 report, the head of the Service reported a 46% fall in fatal workplace accidents compared with 2024 and a significant decline in labour violations, and Parliament’s Economic Policy Committee assessed the report positively (Parliament of Georgia, 2026). For 2024, he told the Human Rights Committee that violations, incidents and fatalities had fallen year on year (Parliament of Georgia, 2025). GILS has documented 32 workplace deaths in 2025, two-thirds of them in construction (see Georgia Wire: 32 Workplace Deaths in 2025).
What independent assessments found
A 2023 civil society assessment found too few re-inspections to confirm that violations had been corrected, inflexible deadlines for correcting violations, no sector-specific inspection plans, and procedures that discouraged workers from reporting violations (Civil Society Foundation, 2023). In 2023 the inspectorate began removing employers’ names from published inspection reports, and reversed the decision after legal action by the Georgia Fair Labour Platform (Human Rights Watch, 2023).
Counter-argument: falling violations prove the system works
Fewer recorded violations and fewer fatalities may well reflect better compliance. But recorded violations also depend on where inspectors go, how violations are counted, and whether workers feel able to complain. Without published data on re-inspections, the share of violations corrected and outcomes by sector, a fall in recorded violations cannot be interpreted with confidence.
The informality gap
About 37% of employment in Georgia is informal, concentrated in micro-enterprises and agriculture (Pignatti, 2026). These workers are the hardest for inspection to reach — and agriculture is the sector covered by Convention No. 129, which Georgia has not ratified.
7. Conclusion
In five years Georgia has built a labour inspection service with a broad mandate and growing activity. The next stage is to show results that can be checked independently: current staffing, the share of violations corrected, outcomes in high-risk sectors, and safeguards for inspectors’ independence. Ratifying Convention No. 81 — already recommended by the European Union and under preparation in the Ministry — would anchor these standards in international law.
GILS Recommendations
- Ratify ILO Conventions No. 81 and No. 129, completing the process the Ministry has started and meeting the European Commission’s recommendation.
- Publish the full annual report and open data — staff and inspector numbers, inspections by sector, violations, sanctions, re-inspections and time taken to correct violations — in an accessible, machine-readable form.
- Strengthen safeguards for independence, including transparent criteria for appointing and dismissing the chief labour inspector.
- Target risk: sector-specific inspection plans for construction, mining and agriculture, and cooperation with the Revenue Service on informal employment.
- Protect complainants with confidential reporting channels and protection against retaliation.
- Commission an independent evaluation of the Service’s effectiveness, with ILO technical support.
GILS Position
Rebuilding labour inspection after a decade without it is a real achievement. Its credibility now rests on transparency — publishing the data that show whether inspection changes conditions at work — and on ratifying the international standard against which labour inspection is measured.
References
- Council of Europe (2023). European Social Charter — Georgia, 16th national report (RAP/RCha/GEO/16(2023)) rm.coe.int
- Civil Society Foundation (2023). Effectiveness of Georgia’s Labor Inspection Process — Factsheet csf.ge
- European Commission (2024). Georgia 2024 Report, SWD(2024) 697 final eur-lex.europa.eu
- European Committee of Social Rights (2023). Conclusions 2023 — Georgia rm.coe.int
- Geostat (2026). Employment and Unemployment www.geostat.ge
- Human Rights Watch (2023). A Victory for Labor Rights and Transparency in Georgia www.hrw.org
- ILO (2022). Guidelines on general principles of labour inspection www.ilo.org
- ILO (2023). About the ILO in Georgia www.ilo.org
- ILO NORMLEX. C081 — Labour Inspection Convention, 1947 (No. 81) normlex.ilo.org
- Law of Georgia on the Labour Inspection Service (2020). Legislative Herald of Georgia www.matsne.gov.ge
- OC Media (2019). Georgia beefs up labour inspection department oc-media.org
- Parliament of Georgia (2025). The Human Rights and Civil Integration Committee gave a positive assessment of the activity of the Labor Inspection for 2024 www.parliament.ge
- Parliament of Georgia (2026). Economic Policy Committee heard the report of the Head of the Labour Inspection Service parliament.ge
- Pignatti, C. (2026). Recent Trends on Informal Employment in Georgia, ILO Working Paper 159. doi.org
Suggested citation: GILS Research Team (2026). Labour Inspection in Georgia Five Years After the Full Mandate. GILS Analysis. Editor: G. Pkhakadze. Georgian Institute of Labour Studies. https://labour.edu.ge/gils-labour-inspection-georgia-five-years-full-mandate/
GILS analyses are prepared with AI-assisted drafting. All figures and claims are verified against the cited primary sources and reviewed under the responsibility of the Editor.
This analysis is also published in GMJ News — Work & Health, the news service of the Georgian Medical Journal.