Asia should address labor migration

Asia should address labor migration

Kim Hak-Su, The Nation, Asia News Network/Bangkok

As international migration always involves at least two
countries, the limited number and scope of bilateral agreements,
and complete lack of a regional framework for dealing with it,
points to an obvious shortcoming on the part of the international
community.

The reluctance of many governments in Asia and the Pacific to
commit to international arrangements concerning migration may
stem partially from the view that labor migration is a temporary
phenomenon that will decrease in importance with structural
changes in their economies. In fact, all indications are that
migration within the region will continue to increase, reflecting
growing disparities in levels of economic development.

Asian countries now regularly deploy over two million migrant
workers per year, while an unknown number of workers migrate
outside of government programs. Economies in East and Southeast
Asia currently host more than four million migrant workers in a
regular status and several hundred thousand unauthorized migrants
and workers. Women constitute a significant share of the volume
of regional migration and the number of women exceeds the number
of men officially deployed as migrant workers by Indonesia, the
Philippines and Sri Lanka.

The recruitment and placement of migrant workers has become a
large industry in many countries and remittances from nationals
overseas earn billions of dollars in foreign exchange for several
countries. The annual sum of remittances exceeds US$10 billion in
India, $6 billion in the Philippines and $1.5 billion in
Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Thailand. These totals are often
greater than levels of official development assistance or foreign
direct investment received by countries.

International migration should not be viewed solely as an
economic phenomenon, however. The large numbers of persons
migrating or working without authorization usually have no
provision for health care and, if concentrated in particular
areas, can impose a burden on local health facilities. Even when
migration is authorized, it causes separation of family members
for long periods. In some instances, children accompany migrants
or are born to them while abroad. Such children of migrants often
receive inadequate health care and schooling. Those born in the
country of destination sometimes face obstacles to acquiring a
nationality, which is a basic right provided in the Convention on
the Rights of the Child.

Given the importance of international migration to every
country in the region, governments need to develop comprehensive
migration policies to include refugee movements, legal migration,
irregular migration and trafficking. These policies should be
integrated into broader strategies of rights-based economic and
social development.

Countries in the region have been able to agree on approaches
to combating trafficking in persons. The South Asian Association
for Regional Cooperation adopted a Convention on Preventing and
Combating the Trafficking in Women and Children for Prostitution
in 2002. Six governments signed a memorandum of understanding on
fighting trafficking in 2004 under the aegis of the Coordinated
Mekong Ministerial Initiative against Trafficking (COMMIT).
Thirty-eight countries participate in the Bali Process, initiated
in 2002 by the Bali Ministerial Conference on People Smuggling,
Trafficking in Persons and Related Transnational Crime.

It is now time for countries in the region to cooperate with
one another and with their development partners in the
international community, including the United Nations and other
intergovernmental bodies, to go beyond agreements on trafficking
in persons to cooperation on all forms of migration but
especially labor migration. Such agreements should cover the
rights and obligations of employers and migrant workers. The most
effective way to prevent trafficking is to provide legal channels
for migration and employment that meets national standards.

In an effort to promote the regional dialogue on international
migration issues, UNESCAP and other international organizations
are convening the Regional Seminar on the Social Implications of
International Migration, to be held in Bangkok from Aug. 24 to
26, 2005. It is our hope that the Regional Seminar will
contribute to the process of building a sustainable and mutually
beneficial migration regime in the region that will make
migration a force for long-term growth and development.

Kim Hak-Su is executive secretary of the Bangkok-based United
Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific.