Achieving fair and ethical recruitment: Improving regulation and enforcement in the ASEAN region

This report focuses on the efforts of ASEAN Member States to foster fair and ethical recruitment. It maps the laws and regulations, and moreover, the enforcement mechanisms States have employed, and reviews evidence of the results achieved.

Job information can be a rare commodity in the labour market – employers know what skills they need but not where to find them; while the workers know their skills but not who is in need of them. Intermediaries such as recruiters play a useful role in resolving this asymmetry of information. In the real world, however, the operation of the recruitment market is highly imperfect. Common recruitment-related abuses faced by migrant workers in elementary occupations include: paying exorbitant recruitment fees to recruiters, deception concerning the terms and conditions of employment contracts, processing fake documents, confiscation of passports or ID documents, and physical as well as emotional violence and threats. The ILO’s General Principles and Operational Guidelines for Fair Recruitment, call on Member States to adopt appropriate legislation and policies to protect the rights of migrant workers.

In the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) region, where labour migration has become prominent, fair and ethical recruitment can prevent migrant workers from experiencing abusive conditions, including trafficking and forced labour. This report focuses on the efforts of the ASEAN Member States to foster fair and ethical recruitment. It maps the laws and regulations of these Member States and the enforcement mechanisms they have employed, and reviews evidence of the results they may have achieved.

Extracts of the first thematic dialogue of Alliance 8.7 Pathfinder Countries

This video presents extracts of the first thematic dialogue of Alliance 8.7 Pathfinder Countries. The online event brought together members of the Alliance to discuss how to accelerate progress towards target 8.7 of the 2030 sustainable development goals. This target seeks to eradicate forced labour, modern slavery, human trafficking, and child labour.

The thematic dialogue, held in May 2022, focused on the topic of recruitment, and what practical measures are taken by governments and social partners to promote fair recruitment in their respective countries.

In these videos we present speakers from Mexico and from Tunisia.

In the first video, we hear from Maestra Ingrid CEBALLOS, the General Director for Institutional Affairs, in the Ministry of Labour and Social Welfare of the Government of Mexico. Maestra CEBALLOS is also the co-chair ILO Fair Recruitment Initiative’s advisory committee.

We then hear from Mrs Luz Maria CHOMBO, Certification Manager for the employer’s organisation AHIFORES (International Horticultural Alliance for the Promotion of Social Responsibility).

In this video, we hear from Mr. Ahmed MESSAOUDI, Director General at the Ministry of Vocational Training and Employment; Mr. MESSAOUDI is a member of the Advisory Committee of the ILO Fair Recruitment Initiative. We then hear from Mr. Abdelkader Mhadhbi from the Tunisian General Labour Union (UGTT).

The webinar was facilitated by Ms. Laura de Franchis (ILO, Geneva), and organised by Ms. Gaëla Roudy Fraser (ILO, Geneva) as part of the implementation of the Integrated Programme on Fair Recruitment (FAIR, phase II) supported by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation.