Malaysia’s electronics sector workforce includes hundreds of thousands of foreign migrant workers who come to Malaysia on the promise of a good salary and steady work – an opportunity to make a better life for themselves and their families. But many are subject to high recruitment fees, personal debt, complicated recruitment processes, lack of transparency about their eventual working conditions, and inadequate legal protections. Unscrupulous behaviour on the part of employers or third-party employment agents1 can exacerbate vulnerability to exploitation, but the system in which foreign workers are recruited, placed and managed is complex enough to create vulnerability even in the absence of willful intent to exploit. The conditions faced by foreign electronics workers in Malaysia have the potential to result in forced labour. In 2012, Verité received funding from the US Department of Labor to conduct a study to determine whether such forced labour does, in fact, exist in the production of electronic goods in Malaysia.
COVID-19 represents a large and sudden exogenous shock to the world. The pandemic itself and the measures being undertaken to slow its pace and effect have short, medium, and long-term impacts on the problem of modern slavery. We have formulated res...Read More
This note provides preliminary guidance for practitioners and policy makers on key issues to consider in ensuring access to justice in the context of the COVID-19 crisis. It is divided into three sections, Preparation, Response and Recovery. While t...Read More
A sector-specific case example ‘The Swedish County Councils’ in-depth review of the human rights policies and due diligence of its IT contractor, Atea, and subcontractor, Dell, to respect workers’ rights has helped increase both companies’ ca...Read More
Edited by Sam Okyere and Prabha Kotiswaran. This is the eighth volume of the series Beyond Trafficking and Slavery Short Course. Women and girls, 'new abolitionists' say, are disproportionately affected by trafficking because of their preval...Read More
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