The risks to migrant workers using informal and unregulated labour migration channels are well documented: forced labour, including labour trafficking; debt bondage primarily due to high recruitment fees; child labour; excessive work hours; underpayment and withholding of wages; denial of social benefits; and unchecked health and safety hazards are all among the risks migrant workers face.
Regulation and explicit, enforced protections are widely recognized as critical to mitigating such abuses. Reforms have been urged by industry and NGO initiatives, and government actors have taken steps to make the formal, so-called Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) channel, more responsive, efficient, and effective.
Yet despite these well-documented risks and efforts to curtail recruitment abuses, informal recruitment channels continue to thrive; a remarkably high number of workers are still using informal means to enter and work in Thailand.
The focus of this paper is to explain why this is occurring.
This publication documents the process of foreign recruitment in case-study migration corridors across different regions. The result of the research brings to the fore the abuse of migrant workers by recruiters and seeks to contribute to broadening...Read More
This report presents findings from a multiple case study of how human trafficking is perceived and experienced in seven local communities in five countries in South and South-East Asia. The aim of the report is to explore and understand local ex...Read More
Most in the anti-human trafficking and modern slavery community agree that trafficking activities are aided and facilitated by corruption. Yet research shows that the available data supporting this assumption is thin. More evidence is needed to bette...Read More
This brief has been prepared by Phil Marshall, Technical Consultant to the Issara Institute. This paper summarizes the current discussion around fee-free recruitment, including: (1) definitions of fee-free recruitment; (2) linkages between migra...Read More
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