Preventing Discrimination, Exploitation and Abuse of Women Migrant Workers - An Information Guide

This information guide of 6 booklets aims to enhance knowledge and understanding of the vulnerability of migrant workers, especially women, to discrimination, exploitation and abuse throughout the international labour migration process and to promote and improve legislation, policies and action to prevent these problems and to better protect vulnerable workers.

Contains

1. Booklet 1. Introduction: Why the focus on women international migrant workers
2. Booklet 2. Decision-making and preparing for employment abroad
3. Booklet 3. Recruitment and the journey for employment abroad
4. Booklet 4. Working and living conditions
5. Booklet 5. Back home: Return and reintegration
6. Booklet 6. Trafficking of women and girls

Dhaka Principles for migration with dignity

The Dhaka Principles have been developed by the Institute for Human Rights and Business (IHRB) following extensive consultation, and are supported by business, governments, trade unions and civil society. They were first unveiled to the public at a roundtable on migration in Dhaka, Bangladesh, in June 2011. They are based on the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights and international human rights principles. The Dhaka Principles outline the worker's roadmap from recruitment through employment to termination, providing key principles that employers and recruiters of migrant workers must adhere to in order to ensure migration with dignity.

Regulating international labour recruitment in the domestic work sector: A review of key issues, challenges and opportunities

Based on a report written by Leanne Melnyk. It addresses the process of international recruitment of workers and highlights both the specific needs and vulnerabilities faced by migrant domestic workers, as well as the main issues and challenges, and innovative practices for better regulation of international recruitment in the domestic work sector.

Addressing governance challenges in a changing labour migration landscape

This report aims to contribute to an informed and balanced discussion of migration and labour issues. It examines the role of the ILO and its constituents in achieving fair and effective governance of labour migration that benefits societies of origin and destination, protects the rights of migrant workers and their families, and enhances social cohesion.

World of Work magazine: Migration should be a choice

The 2017 edition of the World of Work magazine highlights themes discussed by the ILO’s 106th International Labour Conference (ILC), including labour migration and fair recruitment.

Eliminating forced labour: Handbook for parliamentarians No. 30

Effective legislation and regulations on recruitment processes, for both national and migrant workers, help to curtail forced labour and trafficking. Beyond adopting or amending legislation on recruitment, parliamentarians can request the adoption of implementing decrees and hold the government accountable for monitoring implementation. Promoting fair recruitment practices, and averting the occurrence or risk of forced labour through the recruitment process, must be a fundamental part of any forced labour prevention strategy. 

This handbook, co-published with the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), aims to help parliamentarians to make their contribution to global efforts to effectively combat the scourge of forced labour.

Ending child labour, forced labour and human trafficking in global supply chains

Promoting fair recruitment is a critical priority in the context of both international and internal migration. As discussed in PART 1, a key finding of recent ILO research is that recruitment abuses – and in particular the payment of illegal recruitment fees and related costs – are one of the main ways in which forced labour and human trafficking enters supply chains.

The adoption of laws and regulations to help ensure that workers and jobseekers are not charged recruitment or related costs, or subjected to other recruitment-related abuses – addressed in the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration and international legal standards – is therefore critical to broader efforts against forced labour and human trafficking.

Promoting fair and effective labour migration policies in agriculture and rural areas

Migrant workers make an important contribution to the growth and development of rural areas, and more particularly the agriculture sector. However, they face pervasive decent work deficits, which include informality; a lack of opportunities for skills development and recognition, income security, social protection coverage and portability of benefits; and exposure to work-related accidents. Furthermore, they are vulnerable to forced and child labour, human trafficking and unethical recruitment, and – especially in the case of migrant women workers – experience discriminatory treatment.

The ILO endeavours to forge policies to maximize the benefits of labour migration for rural economies around the world, while ensuring the good governance of labour migration and the respect of human and labour rights.