scholarly journals Perilous Wages: Predicaments of Female Labour Migration from Bangladesh to the Middle East

2018 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 61
Author(s):  
M. Saiful Islam

The recent bilateral agreement between Bangladesh and the Gulf Cooperation Countries (GCC) has facilitated migration of female domestic workers, which has opened up an opportunity as well as challenge for Bangladesh. Opportunities are quite significant in a sense that male migration has already been saturated in the GCC countries which has a major impact on the flow of remittances. The abundant and employable female labour force in Bangladesh could easily contribute to this international labour migration, and thereby add to the national economic development. There are serious problems as well since many Bangladeshi female domestic workers are reported to be exploited, sexually abused and raped by the middle man, recruiting agents, and the overseas employers. Many women fled from their employer and sought shelter at the Bangladesh consulate in Jeddah and Riyadh, alleging that they are either being tortured, not properly fed, paid, or not given job as promised. Many female migrants left their family members and young children at home in Bangladesh, which created further social problems as women are still considered as homemakers and childcare providers in the Bangladeshi cultural context. At this backdrop, the time is up to find out ways to make female domestic migration safe and secure. Both the sending and receiving countries must come up with policies and awareness programs that would ensure safety for the female domestic workers. It requires a strong commitment from both the sending and receiving countries that the policies, acts and laws are in favour of female migrant workers. National and international NGOs, civil society and media could play vital role to adopt and implement appropriate policies for safe and sound migration of the female domestic workers.

1983 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 311-326 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert E. Christiansen ◽  
Jonathan G. Kydd

This article examines an unusual phenomenon in the context of modern African labour migration. It explains how Malawi, which had long been a significant source of migrant workers for its neighbours, managed to withdraw over one-half of its international labour force from abroad in the first six years of the 1970s, and to integrate these individuals into the domestic economy within a very short period of time. Traumatic movements of large numbers of migrant workers have been all too common in contemporary Africa, usually manifested as expulsions from host countries during periods of economic stress. A recent notable example was the exodus of about a million foreign workers from Nigeria in the course of one month in 1983. What is unusual about the reduction in international labour migration from Malawi is that it was induced mainly by economic opportunities rather than by coercion.


2012 ◽  
Vol 40 (4) ◽  
pp. 464-485 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jenna K. Holliday

Abstract In 2009, regular labour migration from Cambodia to Malaysia grew at a rapid rate. As the result of a ban imposed by Indonesia, Cambodia’s private sector responded by immediately recruiting to fill the void. The number of women recruited, trained and sent to Malaysia was too high for the Cambodian Government to keep track of and by 2010 reports of underage recruitment, debt bondage and abuse in training centres were growing. Unable to control the recruitment agencies and with growing numbers of reports of abuse in Malaysia, Cambodia banned the sending of domestic workers to Malaysia in 2011. Since this ban, the government has been working to strengthen the system of labour migration management. The changes under way do little, however, to address the specific problems that existed before the ban. In addition, in developing initiatives that are restricted to the establishment of an agreement with Malaysia, increasing regulation and improving conditions in training centres, Cambodia is missing an opportunity to establish a comprehensive and self-sustainable system of protection, welfare and support for migrant workers. Cambodia has a unique opportunity to set up enduring systems that can regulate recruiters and protect migrants as the sector expands to other countries and other industries. In not taking full advantage of this opportunity, there is a real chance that this ban will not be the last.


2018 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 49 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sylvia Yazid

This paper is concerned with two main issues, Indonesian women workingabroad in the informal sector, mostly as domestic workers and the potentialsof other women stakeholders in addressing issues faced by women migrantworkers. This paper is written based on the assumption that an identificationof potential women at various levels and institutions may contribute to thesearch for solutions for the problems faced by the women migrant workersand that women should be seen as active actors that may contribute to theproblem solving. The identification in this paper has been able to identify theexistence of a number of prominent women migrant workers advocates, arguefor their existence in various parts within the labour migration system toguarantee a protected migration for women labour, and suggest for thewidening of the scope and activism of these women migrant workersadvocates, in line with their movements across institutions.


2017 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 67-74
Author(s):  
G. V. Yakshibaeva

The problem of providing the most efficient and rational selection, distribution, use of migrant workers, with regard to both internal and external migration in close relation to socio-economic and demographic interests of the state are currently of particular relevance. Scientific novelty of work consists in the identification of factors and directions of flows as departing and arriving labor migrants in the Republic of Bashkortostan, the characteristics of the development of labour migration and its impact on employment, which allowed to identify problems and negative trends.


Author(s):  
Wiemer Salverda ◽  
Stefan Thewissen

This chapter sets out how inequality and real incomes across the distribution evolved in the Netherlands from the late 1970s through the economic Crisis. Inequality grew, though not dramatically, while wages showed remarkably little real increase. This meant that real income increases for households relied for the most part on the growth in female labour-force participation and in dual-income couples. The chapter highlights the major changes in population and household structures that underpinned the observed changes in household incomes at different points in the distribution. It also sets out key features of the institutional structures in the labour market and broader welfare state, and the centrality of the priority given to wage moderation and the maintenance of competitiveness in the growth model adopted throughout the period.


2021 ◽  
pp. 001946622110212
Author(s):  
Deepak K. Mishra

This article aims to analyse the plight of the migrant workers in India during the Covid 19 pandemic from a political economy perspective. While taking note of the disruptions and uncertainties during the drastic lockdown that was announced suddenly, it is argued that the vulnerabilities of the migrant labour force are deeply embedded in the long-term changes in the political economy of development in India. These changes, on the one hand, have resulted in the gradual weakening of state support to the working classes, and on the other, have resulted in the normalisation of ‘cheap labour’ as a legitimate objective of neoliberal capitalist development. Locating the conditions of the migrant working class on the specificities of the manifold restructuring of the Indian economy under neoliberal globalisation, the study attempts to emphasise the structural dimensions of the current crisis faced by the migrant labourers. JEL Codes: J46, J61, O15, O17, P16


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