Prompted by international scrutiny of working conditions on flagship projects in Qatar and the UAE, in 2016, the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre surveyed construction companies on their approach to safeguarding migrant workers’ rights in both countries.
Two years on and with a second survey, the findings show that while a consistent but small group of construction companies demonstrate real commitment to tackling the risks to migrant workers in their operations, the overwhelming majority operate with high risks to human rights and continued disregard for workers’ welfare. In both years, more than 70% of surveyed companies did not respond and over 60% did not have a public commitment to human rights.
This briefing analyses the survey responses and public human rights commitments of construction companies with current projects in the region and makes recommendations to companies, clients and governments to advance the rights of migrant workers.
An overview of the risks to migrant workers on construction projects across the Gulf. Migrant workers make up between 60% and 90% of the workforce in the six countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). Low-wage construction workers are at...
Business & Human Rights Resource Centre has quizzed 100 construction companies operating in Qatar and the UAE on the measures they are taking to stop exploitation of migrant workers. Only 22 responded, indicating a shocking level of inaction. Despite increasing...
This report gives an insight into the link between corporate practices in the Arabian Gulf’s engineering and construction sector and the recruitment – in South Asian countries like India and Bangladesh – of many of the migrant workers who staff the industry’s projects.
Since 2013, the number of British nationals referred into the National Referral Mechanism (NRM) as potential victims of modern slavery has increased year on year, rising from 90 in 2013 to 3,952 in 2021. These figures include potential adult and chi...Read More
This briefing note presents key findings and insights from a study conducted by Responsible Business Alliance (RBA), in collaboration with Verité, Ulula, and the Fair Hiring Initiative, with Vietnamese migrant workers at four destination workplaces...Read More
When moving towards mitigating or ultimately preventing trafficking in human beings and labour exploitation (THB/LE) in supply chains, a wider perspective is needed, one that includes human rights and decent working conditions. THB/LE is the extreme...Read More
This ASSESSMENT MATRIX explains how to measure evidence of national legislative and policy responses to sexual exploitation of children in the context of travel and tourism as identified in the legal checklist. Measurable indicators for each of the ...Read More
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