essay on migrant workers

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Migrant Workers

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Who are Migrant Workers?

A migrant worker is a person who is to be engaged, is engaged or has been engaged in a remunerated activity in a State of which they are not a national [1]  (information on internal migrant workers is included in a separate call-out box below). Migrant labour is work undertaken by individuals, families or communities who have moved from abroad. Migrant workers contribute to growth and development in their ‘host’ countries or regions, while countries or regions of origin benefit from the skills these workers gather while away, and from any taxes or remittances sent ‘home’.

Migrant workers often face challenges to and abuse of their human and labour rights in the workplace due to discrimination against them. This can occur in many ways, such as:

• Unfair recruitment practices, such as charging fees, requiring migrants to put up a bond, or giving misleading or incorrect information about a promised job;
• Trafficking or smuggling workers across borders for work, and/or entering the worker into forced labour in the new destination;
• Unequal access to employment rights, remuneration, social security, trade union rights, employment taxes or access to legal proceedings and remediation; and
• Workplace racism or discrimination.

What is the Dilemma?

Migrant workers can make a  positive contribution  to business performance and productivity by filling skill gaps, increasing access to international knowledge, strengthening contacts in international networks and local networks through new language skills and cultural awareness.

However, migrant labour can also pose a dilemma to businesses as migrant workers — whether in a regular or an irregular situation — can face a range of challenges to their rights, including discrimination from other workers, employers and laws, unfair working conditions and harmful recruitment practices. Migrant workers are particularly at risk of other human rights violations, such as being trapped in forced labour due to abuse of vulnerability, a lack of understanding of their rights and a lack of social capital or power.

Businesses can struggle to ensure that migrant workers in their operations and supply chains have their rights upheld, especially when Governments do not fulfil their duty to protect and their obligations under international human rights instruments (such as the  International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families ).

Internal Migrant Workers

While this issue focuses on international migrant workers given their specific vulnerabilities to labour rights abuses, internal migrant workers also face similar challenges in securing adequate working and living conditions.

Exact global figures for the number of internal labour migrants (those who have moved within their country for work) are not known. However, disruptions arising out of the coronavirus pandemic have drawn global attention to their plight — particularly in India, where millions of  internal migrants  were left economically devastated by state-wide lockdowns in 2020.

Internal migrants remain on the periphery of the COVID-19 recovery process and are disadvantaged when it comes to securing social protections, safe living and working conditions and access to justice. India’s migrant crisis has also  put the spotlight  on other countries whose economies are dependent on internal migration, such as China, Thailand, Indonesia, Kenya, Uganda, South Africa and Brazil.

Prevalence of Migrant Labour

According to the  UN World Migration Report 2022 , there have been ‘historic’ changes in migration in the last decade, and even during COVID-19, there has been an increase in the number of displaced people in the world. While many of those displaced are fleeing from harm, many others are migrating due to dire economic conditions. It is  estimated  that there were more than 280 million international migrants globally in 2020, 245 million of which are working age (aged 15 and over). According to the International Labour Organization ( ILO ), the number of international migrant workers totalled 169 million in 2021, constituting nearly 5% of the global workforce.

Key drivers contributing to the growing mobility of workers:

• Lack of jobs and decent working conditions;
• The widening income inequalities within and between countries;
• A growing demand for skilled and low-skilled workers in migrant destination countries (often driven by strong growth, ‘shortages’ of domestic labour or rigid societal norms);
• Demographic changes, with countries seeing declining labour forces and aging populations.

Key trends include:

• According to the  ILO , women constitute 41.5% and men 58.5% of migrant workers (2021).
• Sector figures show that 66.2% of migrant workers are in services, 26.7% are in industry and 7.1% are in agriculture (2021).
• Of the estimated 169 million international migrant workers, 67.4% are in high-income countries and 19.5% in upper middle-income countries (2021).
• ILO research  suggests that the world’s migrant workers are distributed among the major regions as follows: Europe and Central Asia, 37.7%; Americas, 25.6%; Arab States, 14.3%; Asia and the Pacific, 14.2%; and Africa, with only 8.1% (2021).
• The labour force participation rate of migrants at 69% is higher than the labour force participation of non-migrants at 60.4% (2021).

Impacts on Businesses

Businesses can be impacted by migrant labour risks in their operations and supply chains in multiple ways:

• Legal risk : There is a close link between migrant labour and human rights abuses such as forced labour, modern slavery and child labour, as migrant workers are often in situations of vulnerability. Companies can face legal charges and severe consequences if they are found to have any of the above issues in their operations or supply chains.
• Reputational and brand risk : Campaigns by non-governmental organizations (NGOs), trade unions, consumers and other stakeholders against multinational corporations (MNCs) alleged to abuse migrant workers can result in reduced sales and brand erosion.
• Financial risk : Suppliers and clients may end contracts and relationships with companies that are found to abuse migrant workers’ rights, or be linked to abuse, in their supply chain, resulting in reduced sales. Divestment and/or avoidance by investors and finance providers (many of which are increasingly applying environmental, social and governance (ESG) criteria to their decision-making) can result in reduced or more expensive access to capital and reduced shareholder value.
• Loss of diversity, skills and creativity : Where migrant workers are not treated fairly or with respect, they may leave for other employment and leave behind a skills gap.
• Operational risk : Changes to a company’s supply chains made in response to the discovery of harmful migrant labour conditions may result in disruption. For example, companies may feel the need to terminate supplier contracts (resulting in potentially higher costs and/or disruption) and direct sourcing activities to lower-risk locations.

Impacts on Human Rights

Abuse of migrant workers has the potential to impact a range of human rights, [2]  including but not limited to:

• Right to equality of treatment and non-discrimination  ( ICRMW , Articles 43 and 45,  ICCPR , Article 2,  ICESCR , Article 2): Migrant workers can be subject to unequal treatment when compared to nationals. This is likely to occur in recruitment processes, their treatment at the workplace as well as in terms of the legal protections that they are afforded in the workplace.
• Right to freedom from slavery and forced labour  ( UDHR , Article 4,  ICRMW , Article 11,  ICCPR , Article 8): Migrant workers are at a higher risk of being subject to conditions that may amount to forced labour and/or modern slavery. For example, migrant workers may face the retention of identity documents, debt bondage and restriction of movement, which are some of the indicators of forced labour.
• Right to freedom of movement  ( ICRMW , Article 39,  UDHR , Article 13): The freedom of movement of migrant workers can be severely restricted through, for example, the confiscation of passports or other travel documents.
• Right of migrants to form, join and participate in associations and trade unions  ( ICRMW , Article 26 and 40;  ICCPR , Article 22;  ICESCR , Article 8): In many situations, migrants may — due to their legal status, the legal frameworks in which they operate in or their relatively weak negotiating position — be denied the right to freedom of association. ICCPR and ICESCR specify that all workers (including migrant workers in a regular situation) have the right to form and join trade unions for the protection of their interests. In addition, Article 26 of the ICRMW affords migrant workers in both regular and irregular situations the right to join and participate in the activities of associations and trade unions.
• Right to just and favourable conditions of work  ( ICRMW , Article 25;  ICESCR , Article 7): Many migrants experience lower pay and poorer working conditions than their domestic counterparts. This can be due to discrimination, prevailing legal frameworks, the legal status of migrant workers and market dynamics.
• Right to an adequate standard of living (including access to adequate food, clothing, housing and water)  ( ICRMW , Article 43;  ICESCR , Article 11): Companies that provide housing to migrant workers can directly infringe on this right if the housing is not of an adequate standard.
• Rights to cultural identity  ( ICRMW , Article 31,  ICCPR , Article 27): Migrants have the right to enjoy their own culture, practice their own religion, and to speak their own language without discrimination. Due to their status, migrant workers may be denied this right as a matter of official policy or through societal discrimination.
• Right to an effective remedy for acts violating fundamental rights  ( ICRMW , Article 83,  ICCPR , Article 3): A lack of accessible operational-level grievance mechanisms may hinder migrant workers from accessing remedies for human and labour rights abuses. This is particularly the case where the legal framework and culture in a country prevent migrants from seeking adequate access to remedy.

The following  SDG targets  relate to  migrant workers :

• Goal 8  (“ Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all ”), Target 8.8 : Protect labour rights and promote safe and secure working environments of all workers, including migrant workers, particularly women migrants, and those in precarious employment.
• Goal 10  (“ Reduce inequality within and among countries ”), Target 10.7 : Facilitate orderly, safe, regular and responsible migration and mobility of people, including through implementation of planned and well-managed migration policies.

Key Resources

The following resources provide further information on how businesses can address violations of migrant workers’ rights in their operations and supply chains:

• ILO,  Fair Recruitment Toolkit : A modular  training manual  on fair recruitment to support in the design and implementation of fair recruitment practices.
• Institute for Human Rights and Business,  Migration with Dignity: A Guide to Implementing the Dhaka Principles : A  practical guide  to implementing the Dhaka Principles of fair and equal labour for migrants. The Dhaka Principles provide a roadmap that traces the migrant worker from recruitment, through employment, to the end of contract and provides key principles that employers and migrant recruiters should respect at each stage in the process to ensure migration with dignity.
• BSR,  Migrant Worker Management Toolkit: A Global Framework : A  toolkit  for respecting the rights of migrant workers throughout businesses and global supply chains.

Definition & Legal Instruments

According to  ILO Migration for Employment Convention (Revised) , 1949 (No. 97), the term “migrant for employment” (or, more commonly, “migrant worker”) means a person who “migrates from one country to another with a view to being employed otherwise than on his [or her] own account”. The  UN Convention for the Protection of the Rights of Migrant Workers and their Families  includes a similar definition. Migrant labour is the work undertaken by someone considered a migrant.

Legal instruments

Ilo and un conventions.

Two main  ILO conventions  comprehensively define the rights of migrant workers and advocate the principles of equal treatment, equality of opportunity and non-discrimination:

• ILO Migration for Employment Convention (Revised), No. 97  (1949): The convention lays out how ratifying States must treat migrant workers and how to provide equal opportunities through law. It includes provisions to facilitate international migration for employment by establishing and maintaining a free assistance and information service and taking measures against misleading propaganda relating to emigration and immigration; provisions on appropriate medical services for migrant workers and the transfer of earnings and savings; and the requirement that States have to apply treatment no less favourable than that which applies to their own nationals in respect of a number of matters, including conditions of employment, freedom of association and social security.
• ILO Migrant Workers (Supplementary Provisions) Convention, No. 143  (1975): The convention focuses on how to prevent abusive conditions in migration and ensure the protection of the rights of migrant workers. It sets out measures to combat clandestine and illegal migration, while at the same time establishing the general obligation to respect the fundamental rights of all migrant workers. It also includes provisions on migrant workers’ cultural rights and individual and collective freedoms and the right of family reunification of the families of migrant workers legally residing in their territory.

The  International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of their Families  (ICRMW) builds upon and expands the ILO Conventions. It applies to all aspects of the life of migrant workers and members of their families, including the situation of women and children. The ICRMW articulates the principle of equal treatment between migrant workers and nationals with respect to remuneration and other working conditions, calling for equality of treatment regarding migrant workers’ and members of their families’ access to housing, social and health services, and educational institutions among others.

Over 50 countries have ratified ILO Convention No. 97, and nearly 30 have ratified ILO Convention No. 143. The ICRMW has also been ratified only by a small number of countries. The implementation and enforcement of national legislation — and therefore the frequency of violations of migrant workers’ rights — may vary significantly from country to country even if all the core conventions related to migrant workers have been ratified.

Article 43 (1)(e) of the  ICRMW  goes beyond a right to urgent medical care for migrant workers in a regular situation. The Committee on Migrant Workers ( CMW ) has stated in its  General Comment No. 2  (2013) that Article 12 of the  ICESCR  provides for the right to the highest attainable standard of health for all persons. State parties are therefore obliged to ensure that all persons, irrespective of their migration status, have effective access to at least a minimum level of healthcare on a non-discriminatory basis.

With reference to Article 12, the CMW interprets Article 28 of the ICESCR more broadly: “Article 28 of the Convention provides for migrant workers … to have the right to receive any medical care urgently required for the preservation of their life or the avoidance of irreparable harm to their health on the basis of equality of treatment with nationals. Article 28, however, read together with other international human rights instruments, may create broader obligations for States parties to both instruments.”

Other Legal Instruments

The UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights ( UNGPs ) set the global standard regarding the responsibility of business to respect human rights in their operations and across their value chains. The Guiding Principles call upon States to consider a smart mix of measures — national and international, mandatory and voluntary — to foster business respect for human rights.

Regional and Domestic Instruments

Regional migrant worker instruments such as the  European Social Charter  and the  European Convention on the Legal Status of Migrant Workers  provide protection of social rights for migrant workers. The European Social Charter is a Council of Europe treaty that guarantees fundamental social and economic rights, with a specific emphasis on the protection of vulnerable persons, including migrants, whose social and economic rights must be guaranteed without discrimination. The European Convention on the Legal Status of Migrant Workers clarifies principal aspects of the legal situation of migrant workers, in particular recruitment, work permits, working conditions and dismissal among others.

Companies are increasingly subject to non-financial reporting requirements and due diligence obligations in the jurisdictions in which they operate, which often include disclosures on their performance. There are several high-profile examples of national legislation that specifically mandate human rights-related reporting and other positive legal duties, such as due diligence, including the  United Kingdom Modern Slavery Act 2015 ,  Australian Modern Slavery Act 2018 , the  California Transparency in Supply Chains Act 2010 , the  French Corporate Duty of Vigilance Law 2017 , the  German Act on Corporate Due Diligence Obligations in Supply Chains 2023 and the Norwegian Transparency Act 2022 .

Also, in 2021 the Netherlands submitted a Bill for Responsible and Sustainable International Business Conduct, and the European Commission announced its  Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD). This Directive is likely to come into force between 2025 and 2027 and will make human rights and environmental due diligence mandatory for larger companies.

These mandatory due diligence and disclosure laws require companies to publicly communicate their efforts to address actual and potential human rights impacts, including migrant labour abuses. Failure to comply with these obligations leads to real legal risk for companies.

Contextual Risk Factors

The prevention of migrant worker abuse requires an understanding of its underlying causes and the consideration of a wide range of issues.

Key risk factors include:

• High levels of migration , particularly of low-skilled and low-paid labour, exacerbates the likelihood of labour rights violations as employers know many migrant workers will be vulnerable or desperate for work. Migrants make up a much larger proportion of those subject to forced labour in specific sectors and locations. Migrants who have their legal employment status tied to their employer under sponsorship visa programmes may be unwilling to report labour rights violations or may be unable to leave or return home without the explicit permission of the sponsor.
• The use of recruitment agencies  and other labour intermediaries raises the risk of migrant workers facing labour rights abuses. Fraudulent recruitment practices may involve agencies, but also other types of formal and informal intermediaries, who exploit migrant workers’ vulnerability and impose excessive fees as part of the recruitment process. Such opaque practices often leave migrant workers in substantial debt leading to conditions amounting to forced labour or debt bondage. Furthermore, excessive or arbitrary wage deductions throughout the period of employment can create further debt for migrant workers.
• Inadequate legal and policy framework  which fails to promote equality of treatment between migrant workers and nationals. The poor protections afforded to migrant workers offer them a low standard of legal protections against forced labour and other labour rights abuses. Labour legislation and workplace cultures in some countries, particularly in Gulf states that employ the  kafala  (sponsorship) system, explicitly provide for preferential treatment and higher payment for local workers than for migrant workers. A lack of strong laws against labour abuse or inadequate criminal sanctions can result in a lack of deterrence.
• Poor enforcement of domestic labour laws  due to inadequate training, an under-resourced labour inspectorate or high levels of corruption.
• High levels of poverty and unemployment, low levels of social protection, and inequalities within a country or region , particularly where the informal economy constitutes a high percentage of the overall workforce. Where there is a lack of state support or formal contracts enshrining workplace rights, workers face greater vulnerability to poor working conditions. This can also cause racism, xenophobia and other discrimination against migrant workers as they may be seen as unwelcome or increasing competition for resources and jobs.
• Low wages and long working hours  can force migrant workers to undertake dangerous or excessive work. Excessive working hours and wages that do not meet minimum wage laws may result in working poverty (see  Living Wage  and  Working Time  issues). Particularly where migrant workers are sending money to their home countries via remittances, they may undertake extreme working hours or overtime to make enough money.

Industry-specific Risk Factors

Given labour migration is a global occurrence, there is migrant labour in every industry in almost every country in the world — and not all migrants work and live under problematic conditions. This issue focuses on three industries that are commonly identified with dangerous and discriminatory practices against migrant labour: construction, agriculture, and fashion and apparel. To identify potential risks for migrant workers in other industries, companies can access the  CSR Risk Check .

Construction

Migrant labour is commonly found in the construction industry, in developed and developing countries. Construction — like agriculture — can be sensitive to economic, social, political and seasonal changes, which can mean highly uncertain working conditions for migrant workers. In some countries — such as the  United Arab Emirates  — up to 30% of the migrant labour pool is engaged in construction. Widespread abuses faced by migrant workers in the construction industry include fraudulent or exploitative practices, such as the withholding of identity documents, excessive working hours, arbitrary deductions or late payment of wages, and being made to work in unsafe working conditions, including not being provided with adequate personal protective equipment (PPE).

Construction-specific risk factors include the following:

• Difficult working conditions : Working conditions in construction are notoriously demanding and dangerous, with high levels of industrial accidents. Migrant workers are more vulnerable to being coerced into working in unsafe conditions that disregard occupational safety and health, especially where there are language barriers or a lack of knowledge of labour rights.
• Living accommodation : Migrant workers are often isolated and living in on-site or employer-provided accommodation, which gives employers control over workers. This often gives rise to risks of sub-standard accommodation or excessive wage deductions for accommodation or transport.
• Transferable skills: Construction skills are often transferable between projects and across countries, which means that workers may not be given specific training on their tasks or the safety and health procedures of a project. This can leave migrant workers vulnerable to abuse of rights and dangerous working conditions.
• Complexity of projects: The complexity of construction projects  exacerbates  a broad range of labour-related risks for migrant workers. Construction projects may involve hundreds of subcontractors. In many instances, contractors are not obliged to pay subcontractors until they have received payment from the client.
• Financial and economic changes : The sensitivity of construction projects to finance and economic changes can lead to periods of intense work. Migrant workers can be vulnerable to excessive working hours as they may want to earn as much as possible in short periods of time, which can result in unhealthy working time.

FIFA — Migrant workers killed while constructing FIFA World Cup Stadium (Qatar)

On 2 December 2010, Qatar was announced as the location for the  FIFA World Cup 2022 . This was met with significant concerns from the human rights community, as well as many political leaders, over how the facilities and infrastructure for the World Cup would be constructed, alongside broader concerns over the human rights conditions in the country.

It has been reported that since construction began, and despite the scrutiny of some leading human rights institutions, there were  over 6,500 deaths of migrant  workers related to construction. The workers were from India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, and many more unreported deaths likely occurred, particularly from countries such as the Philippines and Kenya, which send large numbers of workers to Qatar each year. The ILO found that in 2020, 50 people suffered work-related deaths, 500 were seriously injured, and 37,600 sustained mild to moderate injuries. Migrant workers  are found to have paid expensive recruitment fees, been indebted into ‘bonded labour’, and unable to quit as only the employer could obtain the requisite ‘exit permit’ allowing the worker to leave.

The working and human rights conditions in Qatar in industries such as construction are poor and accidents and deaths are common, particularly among migrant workers, who have next to no rights and operate under difficult migrant labour restrictions.  FIFA representatives   stated that they are “fully committed to protecting the rights of workers on site” but subcontracting and ‘off-site’ conditions and treatment of workers — such as unsafe accommodation and no access to water in extreme summer heat — creates risks for migrant workers.  Companies  associated with FIFA and the 2022 World Cup, including Adidas, Coca-Cola and Visa, faced scrutiny over their support for the Qatari World Cup and FIFA while human rights abuses are so prevalent.

• ILO,  Migrant Work & Employment in the Construction Sector : This  resource  looks at some of the barriers migrant workers can face in accessing fair, safe and decent work in the construction sector. It includes recommendations for employers on how to ensure better working conditions for migrant workers.
• ILO, Why Fair Recruitment Matters: This training toolkit provides specific advice on how businesses can establish fair recruitment processes.
• Business and Human Rights Resource Centre,  A Human Rights Primer for Business: Understanding Risks to Construction Workers in the Middle East : This  resource  provides specific regional advice for construction companies operating in the Middle East and key human rights risks to look out for, with a focus on the labour rights issues faced by migrant workers.
• BSR,  Migrant Workers and the FIFA World Cup 2022 in Qatar: Actions for Business :  This  report  gives business best practices and guidelines on how to protect migrant workers’ rights in construction, applicable globally.
• Stronger Together,  Construction :  A range of  advice, campaigns and resources  to tackle modern slavery and migrant worker issues in the construction sector.

Fashion and Apparel

The fashion and apparel industry has many characteristics that make the exploitation of  migrant workers  more prevalent.  Reports  have highlighted that migrant workers were the worst affected in 2020 when international fashion brands cancelled orders from textile and apparel factories due to COVID-19 — particularly in Turkey and South-East Asia — resulting in  unpaid wages and lost jobs  for hundreds of thousands of workers.

Fashion and apparel specific risk factors include the following:

• Outsourcing : The industry uses a lot of outsourcing and home working, which makes it hard to trace where a product was made and by whom. This presents big risks for migrant workers who may be forced to work and live in dangerous circumstances, as labour inspectors are highly unlikely to ‘find’ them or witness these circumstances to foster change.
• Economic shifts : As with agriculture and construction, fashion and apparel manufacturing is vulnerable to economic changes, as seen in  2020  due to the economic downturn from COVID-19. This can leave garment workers without wages or work for long periods of time, which is particularly harmful to migrant workers who may not have secure homes, who may lose their visas or right to remain if they are not able to secure a new job and those whose ability to get other jobs is low.
• Labour abuses: Migrant workers in the fashion and apparel sector are vulnerable to wage and working time violations and occupational safety and health risks. This is due to challenges in the enforcement and application of labour laws, especially in the lower tiers of supply chains and subcontracting networks; a lack of specific legislation criminalizing the use of forced labour; weak monitoring of recruitment agencies and labour brokers; and increased international pressure to reduce production costs. Other factors include language barriers and cultural discrimination.
• ILO,  Guide for Employers on Preventing Forced Labour in the Textile and Garment Supply Chains in Viet Nam : This  guide  serves as a reference point for companies on social and legal compliance issues (including migrant labour issues) in Vietnamese textile and garment enterprises.
• OECD,  Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible Supply Chains in the Garment & Footwear Sector : This  guidance  aims to help fashion and apparel businesses implement the due diligence recommendations contained in the  OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises  to avoid and address the potential negative impacts of their activities and supply chains on a range of human rights, including migrant labour abuse.
• Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI),  An Investor Briefing on the Apparel Industry: Moving the Needle on Labour Practices :  This  resource  guides institutional investors on how to identify negative human rights impacts in the apparel industry, including recruitment fees, discrimination and those pertaining to forced labour, with some focus on migrant workers.
• Institute for Human Rights and Business,  Migration with Dignity: A Guide to Implementing the Dhaka Principles :  A  practical guide  to implementing the Dhaka Principles of fair and equal labour for migrants. The Dhaka Principles provide a roadmap that traces the migrant worker from recruitment, through employment, to the end of contract and provides key principles that employers and migrant recruiters should respect at each stage in the process to ensure migration with dignity.
• Clean Clothes Campaign,  ‘Made in Japan’ and the Cost to Migrant Workers :  Report  on migrant garment workers in Japan’s state-supported Technical Internship Training Programme (TITP) are subjected to widespread labour violations including poverty pay, debt bondage, enforced overtime, and inadequate and crowded living and working conditions.
• Clean Clothes Campaign,  Labour Without Liberty: Female Migrant Workers in Bangalore’s Garment Industry :  This  report  finds that female migrants employed in India’s garment factories that supply to big international brands are often recruited with false promises about wages and benefits and subject to conditions of modern slavery.
• Asia Wage Floor,  The Emperor Has No Clothes: Garment Supply Chains in the Time of Pandemic :  A  report  on Asian garment workers, including migrant workers, during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Agriculture and Fishing

Agriculture is estimated by the  ILO  to employ around 1.3 billion people (2018) globally, around half of the world’s workforce, many of whom are migrant workers. The seasonal nature of agricultural work means that most agricultural workers are migrant workers who are able to relocate following seasonal patterns of harvesting, fish migration or livestock rearing.

Agriculture and fishing specific risk factors include the following:

• Subsistence workers : Migrant workers are particularly at risk of abuse in the agricultural industry as many live and work in a subsistence fashion, without any permanent accommodation or other form of income. This can result in employers taking advantage of workers and creating abusive conditions, such as excessive working hours, unsafe working environment, lack of PPE and withholding of wages.
• Worker accommodation : Reports  show that temporary migrant worker accommodation in the agricultural sector has been a ‘hot spot’ for COVID-19 transmission during the global pandemic.
• Difficult to trace supply chains : Long supply chains and subcontracting make it difficult for businesses to ensure labour rights are respected for all workers, including migrant workers. Remote locations also mean labour inspections are less likely to occur, and workers are more likely to be isolated from their environment and therefore unable to reach out for assistance or to seek remedy.
• Dangerous work : Agricultural work is one of the most dangerous in the world according to the  ILO . Migrant workers — particularly those who are undocumented or in an irregular situation — often do not have access to health care, so injuries or illnesses that result from agricultural work (such as heatstroke, repetitive strain injuries or exposure to chemicals) can go untreated, potentially leading to significant illness or injury.
• Fishing and whaling : Fishing and whaling are also dangerous occupations as they are mostly undertaken offshore where workers are vulnerable to dangerous tides, weather and storms. Fishing fleets can also stay at sea for months and even years, leaving workers extremely isolated, particularly if they have no access to the ship’s communication system. Fishing is heavily reliant on  migrant labour  and hard to monitor, which means that abusive labour practices are rife and workers are at high risk of being trapped on vessels or abused.
• ILO,  Migrant Workers in Commercial Agriculture : A  report  on the treatment of migrant workers in agriculture and guidance for improvement.
• ILO,  Fishers First: Good Practices to End Labour Exploitation at Sea : This  resource  provides examples of good practices and innovative interventions from around the world aimed at eradicating forced labour and other forms of labour exploitation in the fishing industry, which is heavily reliant on migrant labour.
• ILO, Forced Labour and Human Trafficking in Fisheries : This resource provides companies with an overview of how the fishing industry is affected by forced labour, with migrant workers recognised as high risk in this industry.
• Ethical Trading Initiative,  Addressing Worker Vulnerability in Agricultural and Food Supply Chains (Vulnerable Workers Toolkit) : This  toolkit  provides companies in the agricultural and food supply chain with specific guidance on tackling worker vulnerability, including migrant workers.
• Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO),  Regulating Labour and Safety Standards in the Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Sectors : This  resource  provides information on international labour standards that apply in agriculture and impact migrant workers, as well as on the integration of international standards into national legislation.
• Fairtrade International, Guide for Smallholder Farmer Organisations – Implementing Human Rights and Environmental Due Diligence (HREDD) : This guidance was developed to provide advice and tools on HREDD for farmer organisations to implement.

Due Diligence Considerations

This section outlines due diligence steps that companies can take to respect migrant workers’ rights in their operations and supply chains. The described due diligence steps are aligned with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights ( UNGPs ). Further information on UNGPs is provided in the ‘Key Human Rights Due Diligence Frameworks’ section below or in the  Introduction .

While the below steps provide guidance on respecting migrant workers’ rights, in particular, it is generally more resource-efficient for companies to ‘streamline’ their human rights due diligence processes by also identifying and addressing other relevant human rights issues (e.g.  child labour ,  forced labour ,  discrimination ,  freedom of association ) at the same time.

Several human rights frameworks describe the due diligence steps that businesses should ideally implement to address human rights issues, including working time. The primary framework is the  UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights ( UNGPs ). Launched in 2011, the UNGPs offer guidance on how to implement the United Nations “Protect, Respect and Remedy” Framework, which establishes the respective responsibilities of Governments and businesses — and where they intersect.

The UNGPs set out how companies, in meeting their responsibility to respect human rights, should put in place due diligence and other related policies and processes, which include:

• A publicly available policy setting out the company’s commitment to respect human rights
• Assessment of any actual or potential adverse human rights impacts with which the company may be involved across its entire value chain
• Integration of the findings from their impact assessments into relevant internal functions/processes — and the taking of effective action to manage the same
• Tracking of the effectiveness of the company’s management actions
• Reporting on how the company is addressing its actual or potential adverse impacts
• Remediation of adverse impacts that the company has caused or contributed to

The steps outlined below follow the UNGPs framework and can be considered a process which a business looking to start implementing human rights due diligence processes can follow.

Additionally, the  OECD Guidelines on Multinational Enterprises  define the elements of responsible business conduct, including human and labour rights.

Another important reference document is the ILO Tripartite Declaration of Principles concerning Multinational Enterprises and Social Policy ( MNE Declaration ), which contains the most detailed guidance on due diligence as it pertains to labour rights. These instruments, articulating principles of responsible business conduct, draw on international standards enjoying widespread consensus.

Companies can seek specific guidance on this and other issues relating to international labour standards from the  ILO Helpdesk for Business . This Helpdesk assists company managers and workers that want to align their policies and practices with principles of international labour standards and build good industrial relations.

Additionally, the  SME Compass  offers guidance on the overall human rights due diligence process by taking businesses through five key due diligence phases. The SME Compass has been developed in particular to address the needs of SMEs but is freely available and can be used by other companies as well. The tool, available in English and  German , is a joint project by the German Government’s  Helpdesk on Business & Human Rights  and the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH.

1. Develop a Policy Commitment on Migrant Labour

As per the  UNGPs , a human rights policy should be:

• “Approved at the most senior level” of the company;
• “Informed by relevant internal and/or external expertise”;
• Specific about company’s “human rights expectations of personnel, business partners and other parties directly linked to its operations, products or services”;
• “Publicly available and communicated internally and externally to all personnel, business partners and other relevant parties”; and
• “Reflected in operational policies and procedures necessary to embed it throughout the business”.

It is important for businesses to include migrant workers in their policies regarding human rights, regardless of the nature of work, location of supply chain or industry of operation, due to the international prevalence of migrant workers. The  Dhaka Principles  are a helpful tool that can be used by businesses to support migrant workers in all stages of due diligence. Along these lines, a company may consider adopting codes of conduct to ensure that they demand equal employment and non-exploitation practices with regard to migrant workers. Policies could include commitments such as:

• Comply with national law relating to migrant workers at a minimum and aspire to adherence with international standards and best practice;
• Refrain from engaging in or supporting unequal treatment or exploitation of migrant workers in hiring, termination, remuneration, training, promotion or retirement;
• Avoid restrictions on migrant workers including the withholding of passports and other travel documents; and
• Enshrine clear guidelines with regard to recruitment practices (including those of suppliers and business partners where possible) that contain specific recommendations on recruitment fees and contracts.

Some companies publish stand-alone migrant workers policies, given migrant workers’ vulnerability to labour rights abuses in their industries — for example, UK fashion house  Burberry , Swedish retailer  H&M  and tech company  Hewlett-Packard . However, it is more common for businesses to integrate migrant labour into their human rights, responsible sourcing or diversity policies, with  Unilever  offering an example. Where companies do not have a stand-alone human rights policy, migrant labour is often addressed in other documentation, such as a business code of conduct or ethics and/or a supplier code of conduct.

Businesses may also consider aligning their policies with relevant industry-wide or cross-industry policy commitments, for example:

• Responsible Business Alliance (RBA)  Code of Conduct
• amfori BSCI  Code of Conduct
• Fair Labor Association (FLA)  Code of Conduct
• World Employment Confederation (WEC)  Fair Recruitment and Migration Policies
• United Nations Global Compact-OHCHR,  A Guide for Business: How to Develop a Human Rights Policy : This  guidance  provides recommendations on how to develop a human rights policy and includes extracts from companies’ policies referencing migrant workers.
• Institute for Human Rights and Business,  Migration with Dignity: A Guide to Implementing the Dhaka Principles :  A  practical guide  to implementing the Dhaka Principles of fair and equal labour for migrant workers and writing policies. The Dhaka Principles provide a roadmap that traces the migrant worker from recruitment, through employment, to the end of contract and provides key principles that employers and migrant recruiters should respect at each stage in the process to ensure migration with dignity.
• BSR,  Migrant Worker Management Toolkit: A Global Framework :  A  toolkit  for respecting the rights of migrant workers throughout businesses and global supply chains, which includes guidance on a recruitment policy for migrant workers.
• Verité,  Fair Hiring Toolkit :  This  toolkit  offers tools, guidance and approaches to support the responsible recruitment and hiring of migrant workers in global supply chains, including guidance on improving codes of conduct and company policies.
• Interfaith Centre on Corporate Responsibility (ICCR),  Best Practice Guidance on Ethical Recruitment of Migrant Workers :  A  report  on migrant worker recruitment and examples of best practice (including policies).
• SME Compass : Provides  advice on how to develop a human rights strategy and formulate a policy statement.
• SME Compass, Policy statement : Companies can use this practical guide to learn to develop a policy statement step-by-step. Several use cases illustrate how to implement the requirements.
• United Nations Global Compact and ILO, Advancing decent work in business Learning Plan : This learning plan , helps companies understand each Labour Principle and its related concepts and best practices as well as practical steps to help companies understand and take action across a variety of issues.

2. Assess Actual and Potential Migrant Labour Impacts

The  UNGPs  note that impact assessments:

• Will vary in complexity depending on “the size of the business enterprise, the risk of severe human rights impacts, and the nature and context of its operations”;
• Should cover impacts that the company may “cause or contribute to through its own activities, or which may be directly linked to its operations, products or services by its business relationships”;
• Should involve “meaningful consultation with potentially affected groups and other relevant stakeholders” in addition to other sources of information such as audits; and
• Should be ongoing.

Impact assessments should look at both actual and potential impacts, i.e. impacts that have already manifested or  could  manifest. This compares to risk assessment that would only look at potential impacts and may not satisfy all of the above criteria.

Upon identification of operations or segments of supply chains that rely heavily on migrant labour, companies should consider assessing actual and potential migrant labour impacts. Impact assessments should consider the following:

• Migrant workers are particularly vulnerable to abuse as their right to live or work in a country may be tied to a job with their employer (for instance a sponsorship system) or they may be working illegally and not want to risk losing their job and being exposed to authorities.
• Assessments should consider conducting off-site interviews as workers may not be comfortable talking about harmful work experiences on-site.
• There is also an increasing trend of assessing risks of labour rights violations through ‘ worker voice ’ tools, such as technology-enabled worker surveys. These can be easily adapted to different languages to accommodate migrant workers’ needs.

Migrant labour impact assessments are usually undertaken as part of broader human rights risk assessments. The requirement to engage with potentially affected stakeholders is key.  Nike  offers an example of a company conducting a risk assessment focused specifically on recruitment practices of migrant workers through Verité’s  CUMULUS  Forced Labor Screen TM  tool.

• BSR,  Migrant Worker Management Toolkit: A Global Framework :  A  toolkit  for respecting the rights of migrant workers with a section on how to better understand a country’s context to evaluate the risks of migrant worker issues.
• Verité,  Fair Hiring Toolkit :  This  toolkit  offers tools, guidance and approaches to support the responsible recruitment and hiring of migrant workers in global supply chains, including guidance on identifying company risk and vulnerability to the human trafficking and forced labour of migrant workers.
• Ethical Trading Initiative,  Managing Risks Associated with Modern Slavery: A Good Practice Note for the Private Sector :  This  resource  provides detailed guidance on how companies can assess the risk of modern slavery in global supply chains with a special focus on migrant workers.
• CSR Risk Check: A  tool  allowing companies to check which international CSR risks (including related to migrant worker rights) businesses are exposed to and what can be done to manage them. The tool provides tailor-made information on the local human rights situation as well as environmental, social and governance issues. It allows users to filter by product/raw material and country of origin. The tool was developed by MVO Netherland; the  German  version is funded and implemented by the German Government’s  Helpdesk on Business & Human Rights  and  UPJ .
• SME Compass : Provides advice on how to assess actual and potential human rights risks and how to assess and prioritize risks.
• SME Compass, Risk Analysis Tool : This tool helps companies to locate, asses and prioritize significant human rights and environmental risks long their value chains.
• SME Compass, Supplier review : This practical guide helps companies to find an approach to manage and review their suppliers with respect to human rights impacts.
• SME Compass: Interview guide for civil society actors : This guide provides support to companies for interviews with civil society actors, and is structured along the five phases of the Due Diligence Compass.

3. Integrate and Take Action to Address Migrant Labour Impacts

As per the  UNGPs , effective integration requires that:

• “Responsibility for addressing [human rights] impacts is assigned to the appropriate level and function within the business enterprise” (e.g. senior leadership, executive and board level);
• “Internal decision-making, budget allocations and oversight processes enable effective responses to such impacts”.

The actions and systems that a company will need to apply will vary depending on the outcomes of its impact assessment. For example, companies could consider conducting training on migrant workers’ rights for employees most likely to encounter migrant workers, such as procurement, human resources and supply chain personnel. Training sessions on migrant labour can also be offered to suppliers. Training might include reference to the relevant international standards and reporting lines, and could be updated in-line with new innovations and adjustments to best practices.

Companies might also consider adapting existing worker training programmes to accommodate migrant workers more easily. This might include, for example, the offer of local language courses to improve communication and enhance productivity and worker safety. Additional training and orientation programmes could also be provided to migrant workers to ensure that they have access to equal opportunities in the workplace and to support their assimilation into the local community.

A company may opt to recruit migrant workers directly rather than through the use of brokers. Any brokers used should be reviewed carefully to ensure that they comply fully with all laws for protecting migrant workers by way of carrying out due diligence (see IOM resources on  ethical recruitment ). A company may also choose to publish and communicate guidance on its expectations regarding the recruitment and employment of migrant workers, including by business partners and suppliers. In situations where the risk of exploitation may be higher in supply chains, a company may wish to incentivize suppliers to improve their recruitment practices. This can be done, for example, by providing preferential terms to suppliers who recruit directly.

Multi-stakeholder initiatives (MSIs) can provide the necessary expertise, guidance and economies of scale to address migrant labour problems in a responsible, sector-specific way. Such MSIs can also help companies learn from different stakeholder groups including business, Government, civil society and intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations. An example is the partnership between the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) and  H&M in 2019,  which promotes cooperation in relation to the ethical recruitment of migrant workers in global textile supply chains. Other MSIs include those by the  Fair Labor Association  and the  Roundtable on Sustainable Palm oil,  both of which run campaigns on migrant labour.

• ILO,  The Migrant Pay Gap: Understanding Wage Differences between Migrants and Nationals :  This  report  gives information on pay gaps between migrants and nationals and tips on how to address this.
• ILO,  Global Guidelines on the Prevention of Forced Labour Through Lifelong Learning and Skills Development Approaches :  This  guidance  on developing forced labour training modules (with a focus on migrant labour) for employees and suppliers, including awareness-raising strategies to identify forced labour risks.
• IOM,  IRIS: Ethical Recruitment,   Tools and Resources :  IRIS  is the flagship initiative of the IOM that seeks to promote ethical recruitment of migrant workers. Reports, e-courses and other toolkits on ethical recruitment can be found in the ‘Resources’ section of their website.
• Ethical Trading Initiative:  A range of  resources  for employers on how to protect migrant workers in their businesses and supply chains, including in the aftermath of COVID-19.
• BSR,  Migrant Worker Management Toolkit: A Global Framework :  A  toolkit  for respecting the rights of migrant workers, including a section on capacity-building to improve company-wide knowledge on migrant workers’ rights, as well as a section on supporting migrant workers post-arrival through training, cultural and language support and health awareness education.
• ILO,  Fair Recruitment Toolkit :  A modular  training manual  on fair recruitment to support in the design and implementation of fair recruitment practices.
• Verité,  Fair Hiring Toolkit :  This  toolkit  offers tools, guidance and approaches to support the responsible recruitment and hiring of migrant workers in global supply chains, including guidance on raising awareness/building capacity, screening/evaluating labour recruiters and multi-stakeholder engagement.
• Interfaith Centre on Corporate Responsibility,  Best Practice Guidance on Ethical Recruitment of Migrant Workers :  A  report  on migrant worker recruitment and examples of best practice (including supplier relationship/management and industry leadership/collaboration).
• Ergon Associates and Ethical Trading Initiative,  Managing Risks Associated with Modern Slavery — A Good Practice Note for the Private Sector :  This  resource , produced with the assistance of IFC, CDC Group, EBRD and DFID, provides detailed guidance on how companies can take action to address modern slavery risks in global supply chains with a special focus on migrant workers.
• SME Compass:  Provides  advice  on how to take action on human rights by embedding them in your company, creating and implementing an action plan, and conducting a supplier review and capacity building.
• SME Compass, Identifying stakeholders and cooperation partners : This practical guide is intended to help companies identify and classify relevant stakeholders and cooperation partners.
• SME Compass, Standards Compass : This online tool offers guidance on what to pay attention to when selecting sustainability standards or when participating in multi-stakeholder initiatives. It allows comparing standards and initiatives with respect to their contribution to human rights due diligence and their potential limitations.

4. Track Performance on Migrant Labour

As per the  UNGPs , tracking should:

• “Be based on appropriate qualitative and quantitative indicators”;
• “Draw on feedback from both internal and external sources, including affected stakeholders” (e.g. through grievance mechanisms).

Businesses should regularly review their approach to migrant worker rights to see if it continues to be effective and is having the desired impact. Audits and social monitoring are common ways to check performance in the first tier of the supply chain. Such monitoring or audits can be undertaken internally by the company or by a third party contracted by the company. Operations and supply chains can be audited to understand the way migrant workers are treated and the rights they are afforded — such as their wages, working hours and living conditions — as well as whether they have access to their own documentation (such as passports) and whether they have been charged any recruitment fees. Common supplier audit frameworks that span most industries and include migrant labour indicators include  SMETA  audits and  SA8000 accredited audits . The  amfori BSCI Code of Conduct  also provides guidance on how to mitigate negative social impacts on migrant workers.

A common approach or first step taken by companies is to issue self-assessment questionnaires (SAQs) to suppliers, requesting information and evidence on their migrant labour procedures, such as whether suppliers have implemented monitoring measures to identify the groups most vulnerable to forced labour, whether recruitment agencies are used in the recruitment process, which agencies are used and how they ensure the respect of migrant workers’ rights. Repeated SAQs can give insight into improvements in supplier management systems and let suppliers self-report on actual or potential migrant worker rights issues. Where SAQ results warrant it, companies can carry out on-the-ground or  remote suppliers audits .

Examples of questions to include in social audits or SAQs are as follows:

• Do migrant workers have the freedom to terminate employment (by means of notice of reasonable length) at any time without a penalty?
• Have migrant workers paid a recruitment fee, or do they owe money from their wages to a recruiter?
• Have important documents, such as a visa, right to work, or passports, been withheld from migrant workers by the employer?

If shortcomings are identified, corrective action plans (CAPs) should be developed jointly with the supplier, setting out clear targets and milestones for improvement. Progress should then be tracked regularly to ensure CAP completion. Setting SMART targets helps track performance. SMART targets are those that are: specific, measurable, attainable, resourced and time-bound. Examples of indicators to be recorded and monitored include:

• Grievances from migrant workers recorded (number and nature)
• Audit findings on violations of migrant workers’ rights
• Progress on corrective action plans
• Media reports on instances of abuse of migrant workers
• Official inspection outcomes

Due diligence processes should be regularly checked and continuously improved to ensure that the information collected for these targets is as accurate as possible. This includes checking the effectiveness of grievance mechanisms (i.e. their accessibility to migrant workers), the quality of audits, etc. Responsibility for data collection should be clearly allocated to relevant roles within the company and reported with a set frequency (for instance once a month).

Although both SAQs and audits are commonly used by companies in various industries, both tools have  limitations  in their ability to uncover hidden violations, including violations of migrant worker rights. Unannounced audits somewhat mitigate this problem but even these are not always effective at identifying violations given that an auditor tends to spend only limited time on-site. Furthermore, human rights violations, including migrant workers’ rights, often happen further down supply chains, whereas audits often only cover ‘Tier 1’ suppliers.

New tools such as technology-enabled worker surveys/‘ worker voice ’  tools allow real-time monitoring and partly remedy the problems of traditional audits. An increasing number of companies complement traditional audits with ‘worker voice’ surveys (e.g.  Unilever  and  VF Corporation ), which can be easily adapted to different languages to accommodate migrant workers’ needs and anonymized so workers don’t fear reprisal.

Some companies go further and adopt ‘ beyond audit ’ approaches, which are built on proactive collaboration with suppliers rather than on supplier monitoring (‘carrots’ rather than ‘sticks’). Collaborating with other stakeholders, including workers’ organizations, law enforcement authorities, labour inspectorates and non-governmental organizations to proactively identify, remediate and prevent abuse of migrant worker rights can also prove to be effective.

• ILO,  Fair Recruitment Toolkit : A modular  training manual  on fair recruitment to support in the design and implementation of fair recruitment practices.
• ILO,  Combating Forced Labour: A Handbook for Employers and Business : This  guidance  has suggestions of how companies can track performance on forced labour in their operations and supply chains (with a focus on migrant labour).
• Verité,  Fair Hiring Toolkit : This  toolkit  offers tools, guidance and approaches to support the responsible recruitment and hiring of migrant workers in global supply chains, including a guide on social audits (e.g. conducting interviews with migrant workers, labour recruiters and managers) and taking corrective actions/developing improvement plans.
• Interfaith Centre on Corporate Responsibility,  Best Practice Guidance on Ethical Recruitment of Migrant Workers : A  report  on migrant worker recruitment and examples of best practice (including audits).
• Ergon Associates and Ethical Trading Initiative,  Managing Risks Associated with Modern Slavery — A Good Practice Note for the Private Sector : This  resource , produced with the assistance of IFC, CDC Group, EBRD and DFID, provides the private sector with guidance on how to monitor progress on forced labour (with a focus on migrant workers), including KPIs.
• SME Compass : Provides  advice  on how to measure human rights performance.
• SME Compass: Key performance indicators for due diligence : Companies can use this overview of selected quantitative key performance indicators to measure implementation, manage it internally and/or report it externally.

5. Communicate Performance on Migrant Labour

As per the  UNGPs , regular communications of performance should:

• “Be of a form and frequency that reflect an enterprise’s human rights impacts and that are accessible to its intended audiences”;
• “Provide information that is sufficient to evaluate the adequacy of an enterprise’s response to the particular human rights impact involved”; and
• “Not pose risks to affected stakeholders, personnel or to legitimate requirements of commercial confidentiality”.

Companies are expected to communicate their performance on respecting migrant workers’ rights in a formal public report, which can take the form of a standalone report such as  Nestlé’s Responsible Sourcing of Seafood reports . More commonly, however, an update on progress is included in a broader sustainability or human rights report such as  Unilever’s Human Rights reports , or in an annual  Communication on Progress  (CoP) in implementing the Ten Principles of the UN Global Compact. Additionally, other forms of communication may include in-person meetings, online dialogues and consultation with affected stakeholders.

• I LO,  Combating Forced Labour: A Handbook for Employers and Business : This  guidance  has recommendations on how to report forced labour approaches and results (with a focus on migrant labour).
• UNGP Reporting Framework : A short series of  smart questions  (‘Reporting Framework’), implementation guidance for companies that are reporting, and assurance guidance for internal auditors and external assurance providers.
• United Nations Global Compact,  Communication on Progress (CoP) : The  CoP  ensures further strengthening of corporate transparency and accountability, allowing companies to better track progress, inspire leadership, foster goal-setting and provide learning opportunities across the Ten Principles and SDGs.
• Verité,  Fair Hiring Toolkit : This  toolkit  offers tools, guidance and approaches to support the responsible recruitment and hiring of migrant workers in global supply chains, including a guide on reporting.
• Social Accountability International,  Measure & Improve Your Labour Standards Performance : This  resource  includes tools to help companies implement or improve performance on labour standards, including supporting migrant labour in global supply chains.
• The Sustainability Code : A framework for reporting on non-financial performance that includes 20  criteria , including on  human rights  and  employee rights .
• SME Compass: Provides advice on how to communicate progress on human rights due diligence.
• SME Compass, Target group-oriented communication : This practical guide helps companies to identify their stakeholders and find suitable communication formats and channels.

6. Remedy and Grievance Mechanisms

As per the  UNGPs , remedy and grievance mechanisms should include the following considerations:

• “Where business enterprises identify that they have caused or contributed to adverse impacts, they should provide for or cooperate in their remediation through legitimate processes”.
• “Operational-level grievance mechanisms for those potentially impacted by the business enterprise’s activities can be one effective means of enabling remediation when they meet certain core criteria.”

To ensure their effectiveness, grievance mechanisms should be:

• Legitimate : “enabling trust from the stakeholder groups for whose use they are intended, and being accountable for the fair conduct of grievance processes”
• Accessible : “being known to all stakeholder groups for whose use they are intended, and providing adequate assistance for those who may face particular barriers to access”
• Predictable : “providing a clear and known procedure with an indicative time frame for each stage, and clarity on the types of process and outcome available and means of monitoring implementation”
• Equitable : “seeking to ensure that aggrieved parties have reasonable access to sources of information, advice and expertise necessary to engage in a grievance process on fair, informed and respectful terms”
• Transparent : “keeping parties to a grievance informed about its progress, and providing sufficient information about the mechanism’s performance to build confidence in its effectiveness and meet any public interest at stake”
• Rights-compatible : “ensuring that outcomes and remedies accord with internationally recognized human rights”
• A source of continuous learning : “drawing on relevant measures to identify lessons for improving the mechanism and preventing future grievances and harms”
• Based on engagement and dialogue : “consulting the stakeholder groups for whose use they are intended on their design and performance, and focusing on dialogue as the means to address and resolve grievances”

Grievance mechanisms can play an important role in helping address migrant labour issues in operations and supply chains (e.g.  Hewlett-Packard ). In addition to conventional channels such as those using a hotline, an emerging ‘ worker voice ’ technology allows workers to submit grievances in real-time through text messages and without fear of reprisal.

Remediation of migrant worker rights issues can be complex, as they may have implications on a worker’s right to reside in a particular country, so it is recommended that legal advice is sought. Ensuring that remediation approaches consider the safety and wellbeing of migrant workers is crucial, particularly if they appear to have been trafficked or are under the control of a gangmaster or another illegal group.

Companies could use the results of impact assessments to determine corrective actions, with the most severe impacts prioritized. Some companies may decide that — as a last resort — a failure to remediate or correct the situation should result in termination of the relationship with the offending supplier. Companies should try to resolve issues with the supplier first though, to prevent termination leading to worse positions for workers. Examples of companies with migrant labour remediation programmes include  Nike .

• ILO,  Combating Forced Labour: A Handbook for Employers and Business : This  guidance  has helpful recommendations on remediation actions and grievance mechanisms for businesses (with a focus on migrant labour).
• BSR,  Migrant Worker Management Toolkit: A Global Framework : A  toolkit  for respecting the rights of migrant workers throughout businesses and global supply chains, which includes a section on the grievance process.
• Verité,  Fair Hiring Toolkit : This  toolkit  offers tools, guidance and approaches to support the responsible recruitment and hiring of migrant workers in global supply chains, including a guide on establishing effective grievance mechanisms and protection for whistle-blowers.
• Ethical Trading Initiative,  Access to Remedy: Practical Guidance for Companies : This  guidance  explains key components of the mechanisms that allow workers to submit complaints and enable businesses to provide remedy.
• Ergon Associates and Ethical Trading Initiative,  Managing Risks Associated with Modern Slavery — A Good Practice Note for the Private Sector : This  resource , produced with the assistance of IFC, CDC Group, EBRD and DFID, provides detailed guidance on how companies can develop grievance mechanisms and remediate modern slavery risks in global supply chains with a special focus on migrant workers.
• Global Compact Network Germany,  Worth Listening: Understanding and Implementing Human Rights Grievance Management : A business  guide  intended to assist companies in designing effective human rights grievance mechanisms, including practical advice and case studies. Also available in  German .
• SME Compass: Provides advice on how to establish grievance mechanisms and manage complaints.
• SME Compass , Managing grievances effectively : Companies can use this guide to design their grievance mechanisms more effectively – along the eight UNGP effectiveness criteria – and it includes practical examples from companies.

Case Studies

This section includes examples of company actions to prevent abuse of migrant workers in their operations and supply chains.

Further Guidance

Examples of further guidance on migrant workers include:

• ILO,  The Multilateral Framework on Labour Migration : Non-binding  principles and guidelines  for a rights-based approach to labour migration, which aim to assist Governments, social partners and stakeholders in their efforts to regulate labour migration and protect migrant workers.
• ILO,  Fair Migration Agenda : The ILO  campaign  to ensure fair migration and labour conditions for migrants has a range of information, tools and publications.
• ILO,  Global Study on Recruitment Fees and Related Costs : A global  study  that examines the laws and policies of 90 countries, as well as numerous bilateral labour agreements and multi-stakeholder initiatives to regulate or prohibit recruitment fees and costs charged to workers.
• ILO,  General Principles and Operational Guidelines for Fair Recruitment and Definition of Recruitment Fees and Related Costs : These  guidelines  provide definitions and explanations of key terms related to recruitment fees.
• ILO,  How to Facilitate the Recognition of Skills of Migrant Workers : This  guide  for employers and employment service providers gives information on identifying the needs and capabilities of migrant workers and how to accommodate them in the workplace, particularly in recruitment.
• ILO, Ending Child Labour, Forced Labour And Human Trafficking In Global Supply Chains : This report aims to help businesses develop policies and practices to protect global supply chains from certain human rights issues, including abuses against migrant workers.
• ILO-IOM,  Promoting Fair and Ethical Recruitment in a Digital World: Lessons and Policy Options : This  joint ILO-IOM report  maps four examples of existing State-facilitated digital technology platforms that assist the recruitment, placement and/or job matching for migrant workers.
• ILO,  For Women, by Women: Guidance and Activities for Building Women Migrant Workers’ Networks : This  guidance  outlines how migrant women’s groups can be catalyzed and supported.
• OHCHR and CMW,  General Comments No. 1 – 5 : The  general comments  offered by the CMW provide insight into the human rights violations migrant workers face, detailing expert opinion on specific themes and legal obligations of State parties to the instruments that define these rights.  General Comment No. 5  specifically details migrants’ rights to liberty, freedom from arbitrary detention and their connection with other human rights, with a contextual focus on the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.
• IOM,  Ending Child Labour, Forced Labour and Human Trafficking in Global Supply Chains : This  guidance  highlights the challenges faced by migrant workers and how business can work with Government to prevent migrant labour abuse.
• OHCHR, ‘We wanted workers, but human beings came’: Human rights and temporary labour migration programmes : This report looks at the consequences of temporary labour migration programmes (TLMPs) on migrant workers and their families, and offers recommendations on how to design and implement comprehensive labour migration pathways that offer human rights-based alternatives to TLMPs.
• Fair Labor Association,  Triple Discrimination: Woman, Pregnant and Migrant, Preventing Pregnancy Discrimination among Temporary Migrant Workers, Lessons for Malaysia, Taiwan and Thailand :  Guidance  for employers to avoid multi-factored discrimination against migrant women in supply chains.
• SME Compass , Standards Compass : This online tool offers guidance on what to pay attention to when selecting sustainability standards or when participating in multi-stakeholder initiatives. It allows comparing standards and initiatives with respect to their contribution to human rights due diligence and their potential limitations.
• SME Compass, Due Diligence Compass : This online tool offers guidance on the overall human rights due diligence process by taking businesses through five key due diligence phases.
• SME Compass, Downloads : Practical guides and checklists are available for download on the SME compass website to embed due diligence processes, improve supply chain management and make mechanisms more effective.
• ILO Helpdesk for Business, Country Information Hub : This resource can be used to inform human rights due diligence, providing specific country information on different labour rights.

Migrant workers still at great risk despite key role in global economy

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The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the key role that migrant workers play in the global economy, as well as the “terrible risks” that they are forced to take, to find work.

According to the new International Organization for Migration ( IOM ) Global Migration Indicators (GMI) 2021 report, launched on Thursday, over the past decade migrants in the worldwide labour force have tripled.

IOM’s Global Migration Data Analysis Centre (GMDAC) also flagged that remittances sent home to lower and middle-income countries (LMICs) have outpaced foreign aid.

The analysis featured on the Global Migration Data Portal , provides snapshots of the latest statistics and trends, including the impacts of COVID-19 on mobility.

For example, remittances made up more than 25 per cent of total GDP last year in El Salvador, Lebanon, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Tonga.

“The availability of timely and reliable data can help us maximize the potential of migration for development ”, said Ugochi Daniels, IOM Deputy Director General for Operations.

Demand rising

Migration trends at a glance.

More people than ever live in a country they were not born in.

More than one billion people are on the move.

Many migrate out of necessity.

One in 30 people is a migrant.

One in 95 is forcibly

As exemplified by the many roles of migrants considered ‘essential’ during the COVID-19 pandemic, the report highlights an increase in demand for their labour.

Foreign doctors account for 33 per cent of the United Kingdom’s physicians, according to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and there is an overall reliance on foreign healthcare workers in Europe and the United States.

Surge in overseas workers

There are nearly 170 million foreign workers globally, according to the latest IMO estimates – more than triple the 53 million registered in 2010.

And foreign-born workers play a growing role in the labour force, making up an estimated five per cent of today’s global workforce.

“As we celebrate International Migrants Day this week, this report stands as a clear reminder of the role migrants play in the development of their communities worldwide”, said Frank Laczko, GMDAC Director.

“But while the global economy continues to rely heavily on migrant workers, people continue to face terrible risks when they cannot access legal pathways in their search for better opportunities.”

Migrant safety

While migration policies are difficult to measure, the data available show a trend toward limiting safe, legal migration options .

🆕 Global Competency Standards for #HealthWorkers will provide quality, culturally sensitive care to migrants and refugees, a 🔑 step towards achieving #HealthForAll, including for people on the move.👉 https://t.co/W0rOzuud4Q pic.twitter.com/sZ62jr547n World Health Organization (WHO) WHO

While 81 per cent of the countries participating in IOM ’s  Migration Governance Indicators  (MGI) have at least one government body dedicated to border control, just 38 per cent have a defined national migration strategy, with only 31 per cent aligning it with a national economic development strategy.  

“This reports highlights…the invaluable contributions migrants have in our communities and economies, and the need for concrete action to increase legal channels”, Ms. Daniels said.

Setting global standards

Also on Thursday, the World Health Organization ( WHO ) published the agency’s new  Global Competency Standards for refugee and migrant health services  to strengthen countries’ ability to provide services to refugees and migrants by defining markers to be incorporated into health workers’ education and practices.

“While facing similar health risks to their host communities, refugees and migrants may have specific health needs and are often vulnerable to adverse health outcomes due to their mobility, living and working conditions”, said Santino Severoni, Director of the WHO Health and Migration Programme.

The health workforce has a vital role in providing inclusive services that are respectful of cultural, religious, and linguistic needs, said the UN health agency.

“Refugees and migrants face obstacles in accessing people-centred and culturally sensitive health services in both countries of transit and destination. These can include…restricted use of health services, all of which shape their interactions with the host country’s health system”, said the WHO Director.

The document is accompanied by a Curriculum Guide to support its operationalization.

The competencies can be tailored to various environments and take into consideration the requirements and constraints of local health systems as well as the characteristics of diverse refugee and migrant populations.

“2021 is the International Year of Health and Care Workers ”, reminded Jim Campbell, Director of WHO’s Health Workforce Department.

“The same workers must be supported with a competency-based education, as outlined in the Standards…to take us a step closer towards universal health coverage for all populations, including for refugees and migrants”.

• migrant workers

Types of migration

Labour migration

Data sources & measurement, further reading.

According to the latest available estimates, there were  169 million international migrant workers globally in 2019 and they constituted 4.9 per cent of the global labour force ( ILO, 2021 ). These international migrant workers made up approximately 69 per cent of the world’s international migrant population of working age (aged 15 and over) in 2019  ( ILO, 2021 ). 

Crossing national borders to work is one of the key motivations behind international migration, whether driven by economic inequalities, seeking employment, or both. The additional impact of economic, political and environmental crises and shifting demographics, with ageing populations in some parts of the world and a “youth bulge” in others, contribute to rising labour migration ( Ozel et al., 2017 ).  

There is no internationally accepted statistical definition of labour migration. However, the main actors in labour migration are migrant workers , which the International Labour Organization (ILO) defines as: 

A person who “is to be engaged or has been engaged in a remunerated activity in a state of which he or she is not a national” ( United Nations Convention on the Protection of the Rights of all Migrant Workers and Members of their Families, 1990, Article 2(1) ).

The United Nations Statistics Division (UN SD) also provides a statistical definition of a foreign migrant worker :

“Foreigners admitted by the receiving State for the specific purpose of exercising an economic activity remunerated from within the receiving country. Their length of stay is usually restricted as is the type of employment they can hold. Their dependents, if admitted, are also included in this category.” ( UN SD, 2017 ).

While migrant workers are often also international migrants, not all are (see table below). It is important to note the difference between the definition of a foreign migrant worker and an international migrant . An international migrant is defined as:

“any person who changes his or her country of usual residence” ( UN DESA, 1998 ). 

Data on international migrant stocks are mostly based on country of birth (if different from country of residence). Where no information on country of birth is available in censuses, data on international migrant stocks are based on country of citizenship ( UN DESA, 2016:4 , UN SD, 2017 ). When defining migrant workers , emphasis is placed on a person’s citizenship rather than on their country of birth ( ILO, 2015 ). 

According to the ILO's most recent estimates, there were an estimated 169 million migrant workers globally in 2019 ( ILO, 2021 ). Over two-thirds of all migrant workers were concentrated in high-income countries and approximately 60.6 per cent were located in three subregions: 24.2 per cent in Northern, Southern and Western Europe; 22.1 per cent in Northern America; and 14.3 per cent in the Arab States ( ibid. ). The importance of these top three subregions in terms of the number of international migrant workers they host has not diminished over time. According to previous estimates, the same three subregions hosted the biggest shares of all migrant workers: 60.2 per cent in 2013 and 60.8 per cent in 2017 ( ibid. ). The five OECD countries with the highest inflows of migrant workers in 2022 were United Kingdom (170,300), United States of America (145,700), Canada (135,800), Germany (89,900) and New Zealand (74,800) ( OECD, 2023 ).

Between 2010 and 2019, the number of international migrant workers in Africa increased from 9.6 million to 14.5 million respectively. The average annual growth rate among migrant workers (4.8%) is higher than that of the overall African population (2.7%) ( African Union, 2024 ; African Union Commission and JLMP partners, 2021 ). In 2019, international migrant workers accounted for 2.8 per cent of the total labour force in Africa. Regionally 82 per cent of the migrant workers in Africa in 2019 were in East Africa (4.1 million), West Africa (4.3 million) and Southern Africa (3.5 million), 10 per cent in Central Africa (1.5 million) and Northern Africa hosted 8 per cent (1.2 million) (GMDAC calculations based on African Union Commission and JLMP partners, 2021 ).

Among all migrant workers worldwide in 2019, 70 million or approximately 41.5 per cent were female ( ibid. ). Male migrant workers made up 99 million or 58.5 per cent of the total ( ibid. ). Women represent a smaller share of the total of international migrant workers because they also represent a lower share of the total international migrants (47.9%) and they have a relatively lower labour market participation rate compared to men (59.8% vs. 77.5%) ( ibid. ). However, some significant regional variations existed in the share of women among total migrant workers. In Northern, Southern and Western Europe, women represented more than 50.0 per cent of all migrant workers; in the Arab States, the share was below 20.0 per cent ( ibid. ). Women accounted for 39 per cent of migrant workers in Africa in 2019, slightly lower than the share of women in the total labour force (45%), but an increase from 27 per cent in 2010 ( African Union, 2024 ; African Union, 2021 ). Women working in informal labour or unpaid domestic labour may not be represented in these statistics.

Age breakdown

Adults aged 25–64 constituted 86.5 per cent of all migrant workers ( ILO, 2021 ). Approximately 10 per cent of all migrant workers in 2019 were between 15 and 24 years old ( ibid. ). The share of older workers (aged 65 and over) among migrant workers constituted 3.6 per cent ( ibid. ). In Africa, there were 6.7 million young international migrants (defined here as ages 15-35 years old), constituting 46 per cent of all international migrant workers that year, and 60 per cent of them were male (GMDAC calculation based on African Union Commission and JLMP Partners, 2021 ).

The services sector was the main employer of migrant workers, employing 66.2 per cent of all migrant workers and almost 80 per cent of total female migrant workers worldwide ( ibid. ). A growing demand for labour in the care economy (including in health and domestic work), where the labour force is predominantly female, could partially explain the high share of women migrant workers in the services sector ( ibid. ). As for the remaining migrant workers, 26.7 per cent were in industry and 7.1 per cent in agriculture ( ibid. ). In Africa in 2019, the top three sectors in which migrants were employed were in agriculture, forestry and fishing (27.5%) followed by wholesale and retail trade; transport and storage; accommodation and food service activities (21.9%) and public administration and defence, education, human health and social work activities (21%) ( African Union, 2021 ).

Labour force participation rates

Significant regional variations existed in the share of women among total migrant workers in 2019: women represented more than 50 per cent of all migrant workers in Northern, Southern and Western Europe but the share was below 20 per cent in the Arab States ( ILO, 2021 ). Though the labour force participation of migrant women was lower than that of migrant men, the labour force participation rate of migrant women was higher than that of non-migrant women in many countries.

Data on labour migration and migrant workers are collected in a number of ways. The five main data sources  used to measure the flows and stocks of migrant workers are:

• Population censuses; 
• Household surveys; 
• Labour force surveys; 
• Administrative sources; and 
• Statistical sources ( ILO, 1994/5 ). 

Administrative sources used to measure migrant worker flows include the measurement of new entry or immigration visas, new permissions issued to work in a country, administrative entry registrations at the border and the apprehension of clandestine border crossers ( ibid. ). The measurement of migrant worker stocks include accumulated entry or immigration visas, accumulated permission to work in the country, and estimated stocks of undocumented foreign citizens.  

Other measurements linked to labour migration include recruitment costs and remittances . Aiming to lower recruitment costs can be an indicator of well-governed labour migration, as reflected in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) ( Ratha, 2014 ). It is difficult to use remittances as an indicator for labour migration in countries that have a large UN and/or embassy presence or large transnational corporations because their employees’ incomes are recorded as remittances, causing a significant increase in remittance figures.

Data collection at the global level

The ILO maintains an online database of labour statistics ( ILOSTAT ) as well as a collection of labour force surveys . The labour force surveys are standard household-based surveys of work-related statistics. 

ILOSTAT covers various subjects relating to labour, including labour migration. Indicators on labour migration are split into three subtopics: International migrant stock, nationals abroad, and international migrant flow . 

In addition, the ILO produced the third  ILO global estimates on International Migrant Workers  in 2021, which provides global estimates, estimates by country income group, and regional estimates of migrant workers. The reference year is 2019. Previously, ILO had published estimates in 2015 (reference year 2013) and 2018 (reference year 2017).

The UN Statistics Division collects, compiles and disseminates official demographic and social statistics on a number of topics, including employment. 

The Database on Immigrants in OECD and non-OECD Countries (DIOC) compiles data based on population censuses of OECD countries, and in collaboration with the World Bank has extended coverage to non-OECD countries. The database includes information on labour market outcomes, such as labour market status, occupations and sectors of activity. The datasets cover the years 2000-2001, 2005-2006, 2010-2011 and 2015-2016. 

The Integrated Public Use Microdata Series - International (IPUMS-I) - collects and distributes census data from 85 countries. The database includes population questions that address the labour force as well as labour force surveys.

Data collection at the regional level

The Eurostat database provides comprehensive, harmonized labour force data from 28 European Union member states (1995 to 2023) and five other countries, with data from the United Kingdom up to and including 2018. It also contains data on residence permits by reason, length of validity and citizenship, including remunerated activities reasons (occupation). One dataset ( migr_resocc ) disaggregates data by highly skilled workers, researchers, seasonal workers and others. 

Under the Joint Labour Migration Programme (JLMP), the African Union released the third edition of the Labour Migration Statistics in Africa study in 2021 (reference year 2019), in collaboration with the ILO, IOM, and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA). The study covers labour migration within Africa in 2019, using mainly population and housing censuses, specialised surveys on employment and/or migration, and routine administrative records. 

The International Labour Migration Statistics Database (ILMS) in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) region brings together official government data on international migrant workers’ stocks and flows within the region, as well as information on nationals living or working abroad. Available data available vary, but range from 1990 to 2022.

International Labour Migration Statistics: A Guide for Policymakers and Statistics Organizations in the Pacific  (2015), produced by ILO, the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UN ESCAP) and the UN Development Programme (UNDP), provides some data on labour migration in the region. It also provides recommendations on improving international labour migration statistics and how to collect data through census, survey and administrative data sources. 

OECD’s International Migration database provides annual series on migration flows and stocks in OECD countries. It also provides labour market outcomes of immigrants from 2012 to 2022. 

Data strengths & limitations

Data on labour migration are scattered mainly because it is difficult to collect reliable data on migrant workers. According to the Global Migration Group’s Handbook for Improving the Production and Use of Migration Data for Development (2017), data collection faces the following gaps and challenges:

• Lack of good quality data, including missing populations of interest, inconsistent periods of data collection, or key characteristics not being collected
• Limited data comparability due to different concepts, definitions and measurement methods
• Lack of infrastructure to process data in national institutions or at border crossing points
• Insufficient expertise among staff collecting or analyzing data
• Lack of infrastructure to publish key characteristics, populations or places of interest
• Insufficient priority given to labour migration in national policy agendas and related budget allocation.

There is an ongoing effort to streamline international standards and common methodologies within the field of labour migration data collection. Currently, such standards and methodologies vary across countries, making data not comparable or combinable.

ILO’s Labour Migration Module provides a useful tool for gathering reliable data on different aspects of labour migration, including a series of migration-related questions that can be added to existing household and labour force surveys.

Explore our new directory of initiatives at the forefront of using data innovation to improve data on migration.

Immigration & emigration statistics

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Most low-skilled labour migrants pay fees to obtain contracts and complete recruitment formalities. This is against international conventions and many countries’ national laws that require employers...

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• Review Article
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• Published: 14 October 2021

The plight of migrants during COVID-19 and the impact of circular migration in India: a systematic review

• Joshy Jesline   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-5774-8149 1 ,
• John Romate   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-0487-7849 1 ,
• Eslavath Rajkumar   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-3012-0391 1 &
• Allen Joshua George   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-9662-9863 1  

Humanities and Social Sciences Communications volume  8 , Article number:  231 ( 2021 ) Cite this article

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• Social policy

As per the reports of WHO, the COVID-19, first reported in December 2019, put the whole world in an unprecedented crisis and lingering uncertainty with innumerable deaths, generalised economic depression, unemployment, quarantine, unavoidable lockdown, and travel-ban that was imposed globally as a necessity to tackle the pandemic. Among the populace, the migrants were found to be one of the most vulnerable groups in this lockdown, as their very livelihood came to a complete standstill. This review-paper aims to investigate in detail the multiple facets of adversities the migrants went through in India during the lockdown and the socio-psychological impact of circular migration. Following the PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) guidelines, studies on migrant workers during COVID-19 and on circular migration were searched. Database searches on Scopus, PubMed, and PsychNet and manual searches on Google Scholar were carried out. From the initially identified 15,697 articles, 15 articles that met the inclusion criteria were chosen for review. The findings highlight the different plight of the migrants, who had the pressing need to head back home to safety despite the acute financial crisis and the travel problems. The poor quality of the relief camps with meagre rations and lack of facilities especially put the women and children in distress and generated a lot of psychosocial issues. The present study urges the mental health-care professionals to groom themselves for facing the challenges of a surge in mental illnesses by taking necessary measures. It also emphasises the need to establish a strong ethical alliance between the local population, health systems, local government mechanisms, and human rights associations in order to take a relook at the national migration policies.

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Introduction.

The year 2019 brought with it a new pandemic, the COVID-19 that was first reported in the month of December as per the reports from World Health Organisation, and put the whole world in an unprecedented crisis, that has pushed it into a state of lingering uncertainty (WHO, 2020 ). The coronavirus disease 2019, commonly known as the COVID-19 pandemic, a corollary of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 infection, has led to a global public health crisis, innumerable deaths, generalised economic depression, redundancy, and quarantines (Aragona et al., 2020 ). The virus brought about a massive change to the existing systems and generated a whirlpool of hurdles that the people had never faced before or had no idea how to overcome. This eventually created overwhelming fear and mounting anxiety among the people due to the novelty of the crisis, the uncertainty it brought with it about how and when the situation will get back to normal, as well as the dread of an impending doom (Mishra and Sayeed, 2020 ). One of the biggest challenges was the complete lack of an effective treatment method or a preventive vaccine to overcome the virus (Rolland, 2020 ). To make matters worse, the pandemic affected people not only physically but also psychologically, economically, socially, and politically. People belonging to various socio-economic strata were affected adversely in this situation, regardless of their social status, as everyone had fallen prey to this crisis in one way or another. It is undeniably true that the life in the pandemic era effected a far-reaching change in the way people think, work and interact with one another around the world (Aragona et al., 2020 ). What is more, it has also taught the world the new normal ways of human relationships and social distancing, which are sure to linger on for quite a while (Ram, 2020 ; Rolland, 2020 ). It has also provided the world a lesson about the worthlessness of the rat race and the fragility of human life. It is certainly true that the pandemic has led the world to a paradigm shift in the attitude and behaviour of people as never before.

The pandemic brought with it lockdowns and travel-bans that were imposed by the governments all over the world as a necessity to tackle the pandemic and to rein in its outspread. However, the lockdown upset the daily routines of the people especially the working class who were put in a major financial predicament (Chander et al., 2020 ). A new normalcy of surviving in a state of constant panic came into place, with the people being asked to live in this uncertainty for a longer duration than what was anticipated in the beginning of the pandemic. A batch of novel practices came into existence as part of rigorous mitigation efforts, such as, “social distancing, household quarantine, facemasks, vigilant sanitisation and hand washing, and avoidance of public gatherings, public transportation etc.” (Rolland, 2020 ). As time passed and the situation became worse, the pandemic has slowly unmasked its harsh reality and people have started grasping this truth that the current state of the situation is going to last longer than what was presumed of it in the beginning, and this has affected them rather drastically. The transformational process of adapting to this pandemic risk as a public or global calamity, while dealing with the fear of contracting COVID-19, and managing the disease, is highly exhausting and not doable by all (Rolland, 2020 ).

The daily wagers were the worst sufferers of this lockdown. With the enforcement of the lockdown, not only were they without jobs but also were frustrated because of the cessation of their daily income on which they survived (Ram, 2020 ). Their very livelihood came to a complete standstill; as a result, they could not meet theirs as well as their families’ daily needs (Chakma, 2020 ). The migrants were found to be the most vulnerable among the working class to come under this economy fallout (Nanda, 2020 ). The situation affected people belonging to all classes; moreover, it has exposed in the bare open the blatant disparities that exist in the socio-economic and health-care facilities (Aragona et al., 2020 ). In addition, it has been found that the perils of sickness and deaths vary colossally by “social location, such as, race, social class, gender, age, ability, and geographic location” (Rolland, 2020 ). There were many reported cases of suicide and suicidal attempts especially by people from economically lower classes, as they were not able to cope with the problems stemming from the loss of job and income (Kumar and Vashisht, 2009 ; Mukhra, 2020 ; Nelson, 2020 ).

In addition, the mental strain this pandemic imposed on the common people was especially enormous. One such group that was highly and adversely affected by this crisis situation was the migrants, who had to move out to different parts of the country in search of jobs to sustain their families (Singh, 2020a , 2020b , 2020c ). There are about 100 million internal migrant workers in India, and most of them are daily-wage labourers who have travelled out from different states like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Odisha, West Bengal, etc. to other states in search of unskilled or semi-skilled jobs (Hazarika, 2020). Based on the data obtained from the National Sample Survey (NSS) 2007–2008, out of the total workforce in India, about 28.3% were migrants. According to 2011 census, about 37% of India’s total population were found to be migrants (Singh, 2021 ). This was a climb of 139 million migrants from what was reported in 2001 census (Census of India, 2011 ; Singh, 2020a , 2020b , 2020c ).

These migrants too were trapped in the lockdown with no jobs and no money, facing major economic setback, besides being isolated from their families due to the sudden lockdown (Mishra and Sayeed, 2020 ). While India’s population of 1.3 billion people could not but come to terms with the changes of imposed social distancing, millions of migrant workers in India had other daunting tasks also to confront with (Londhe, 2020 ). The concept of social distancing bears no meaning for the migrants because of the persistence of even more pressing and nagging problems of insecurity and hunger. Based on the data obtained from Census 2011, it was found that there was a rise in total number of migrants by 30% from that of 2001, whose major destinations are growth centres and states like Delhi, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala (Census of India, 2011 ; Dandekar and Ghai, 2020 ; Nanda, 2020 ). Even though, the lockdown situation affected the community at large and people were obliged to stay at home, the migrants could not even be in the comfort of being locked in with their families; instead, they were destined to be stuck in a migrant land with no means to survive (Kumar et al., 2020 ). Therefore, this community had to endure more appalling hardships than anyone else, not only financially but also socially and mentally (Aragona et al., 2020 ; Singh, 2020a , 2020b , 2020 c).

In order to alleviate the suffering of migrants it is necessary to investigate, understand, and analyse the hardships they have been undergoing. In-depth explorations of the studies in the Indian context dealing with circular migration and their psychological impact are needed to foster greater awareness among the public and to introduce new measures that can be adopted to safeguard the rights of the migrants.

This review-paper aims to study in detail the multiple facets of the predicaments the migrant workers were going through in the Indian context during the pandemic and the lockdown. Its main objective is to focus on the hardships that have led the migrants to a circular migration or reverse migration and the adversities that have been brought about by circular migration during the pandemic upon the migrants. The study also aims to shed light on the psychological toll inflicted by this pandemic on the migrants and the resultant reverse migration. Furthermore, it focuses on the means to address the issues concerning their mental health-care, and makes recommendations on the measures to protect their human rights and safeguard their lives and livelihood.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first systematic review that has specifically focused on the plight of the migrant workers during the pandemic and the issues revolving around circular migration in the Indian context. The consequences of this pandemic have put the world in a state of impending doom and therefore, there is a compelling need to address the situation especially of the migrants who are among the groups, which are most affected by the adverse outcomes of COVID-19 and subsequent restrictions on mobility. A systematic review helps to synthesise the data related to this from all available sources and to integrate them in order to efficiently reach and promote awareness among health-care professionals, policy makers, administrative staff, future researchers, and the general public. The findings of this study could therefore be used for formulating new strategies for the betterment of migrant workers.

Types of studies included

Studies on migration and circular migration of Indians during the COVID-19 crisis were considered to be included in the current systematic review, regardless of the type of study, research design, or the outcomes. However, studies on emigrants, immigrants, and migrants in other countries were excluded from the study.

Subjects of the study

The population for the study were unskilled migrant workers in India, who were among the most affected during the lockdown due to their low socio-economic status, besides being increasingly prone to mental health issues.

Search strategy

The search string used in Scopus was: TITLE-ABS-KEY (“circular migration”) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (migration) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (migrant) AND TITLE-ABS-KEY (covid) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (covid-19); in PsychNET (Abstract: “circular migration” OR Abstract: “migration” OR Abstract: “migrant” AND Abstract: “covid” OR Abstract: “covid-19” AND Publication); and in PubMed (“circular migration” [Title/Abstract] OR “migration” [Title/Abstract] OR “migrant” [Title/Abstract]) AND “covid” [Title/Abstract]) OR “covid-19” [Title/Abstract]).

Data management

All pinpointed references were imported to Zotero, a bibliographic reference management tool, and all duplicates were removed. The de-duplicated citations in Zotero were imported to the data extraction form for coding.

Selection of studies

The first and third authors simultaneously screened the articles for the titles and abstracts and did the initial screening and data extraction independently. Articles that dealt with the plight of migrant workers during COVID-19 pandemic were included for the full text review. After the primary screening, the selected articles were reviewed for full text reading to determine their eligibility. The articles were selected if they were falling under the time-period of 2019–20 and discussed the plight of migrants during the lockdown and also addressed their psychological issues during this crisis in the Indian context. Final decision on the eligibility and the reasons for exclusion of studies were documented on the data extraction form.

Study characteristics

The final sample for the systematic review included 15 studies, which were all published in the year 2020. Most of the studies were descriptive and qualitative in nature ( n  = 12) and discussed the plight of the migrants and the various adversities encountered by them in India during the lockdown, while the others ( n  = 3) were quantitative in nature that addressed in-depth the psychological issues faced by the migrants. All the articles were based on the Indian context, and most of the articles were pan Indian in their approach, while some articles ( n  = 4) focused on conditions of migrants in their respective states or cities alone, specifically Chandigarh, Delhi, Bangalore and Kolkata. The articles discussed the various economic, social and psychological issues faced by the migrants. Some articles ( n  = 8) also elaborated on the steps taken by the government and made suggestions about policies that can be adopted to better the lives of the migrants. Among this, some studies ( n  = 3) also focused on making psychological interventions to help the migrants (Chander et al., 2020 ; Singh, 2020a , 2020b , 2020 c; Kumar et al., 2020 ).

The characteristics and main findings of these studies are summarised and presented in Table 1 .

Identification of the studies

In total, 15,697 studies were detected through database searching; among which 15 studies met the inclusion criteria and were further analysed for the present review. (The PRISMA flow diagram is shown in Fig. 1 ). Out of the 15,697 studies, 450 were from PsychNet, 14,988 were from PubMed, 229 from Scopus and 30 from Google Scholar. After the initial screening (which included the removal of duplicates), 106 articles were selected and assessed for eligibility, from which 91 studies were excluded and the final 15 were selected.

Stages involved in finalizing the articles for analysis after obtaining the data.

Distribution of migrants

Based on the data obtained in the Census 2011, it was found that the distribution of migrants to the total population across cities were, Delhi 43.1%, Mumbai, 54.9%, Kolkata 40.8%, Chennai 51.8%, Bangalore 52.3%, Hyderabad 64.3%, Ahmedabad 48.7% and Pune 64.8% (Census of India, 2011 ). As per the reports from a study, it was found that the highest number of COVID-19 cases as of 13 th April 2020 was reported in Delhi with 898 cases followed by Mumbai with 880. The share of COVID-19 cases from these metropolitan cities to the total percent was 38% (Bhagat et al., 2020 ).

Plight of migrants

All the studies focused on the various problems that the crisis has brought for the migrants, including the psychological and social issues. Out of the articles chosen for the current systematic review, the findings from a study (Kumar et al., 2020 ) on the psychological impact of the pandemic on the migrants ( n  = 98), revealed that about 63.3% of participants underwent loneliness and around 48% of them felt that there was a decrease in their social connectedness. Also, they found that roughly 50% experienced fear of death, around 58.2% individuals experienced frustration and tension, about 51% felt irritable and anxious, and three fourth of the participants were diagnosed with depression.

Statistics obtained from studies also suggested that almost only 4% of the total population of the migrants received rations that were allotted by the government, and 29% did not receive rations despite having ration cards (Farooqui and Pandey, 2020 ). Almost 90% of the migrants either faced loss of pay or a reduction in their salary (Shahare, 2020 ). International Labour Organization (ILO) estimated a decline of 22.6% in the wages of migrant workers post lockdown (Gothoskar, 2021 ). A survey conducted across 179 districts in India from May 30, 2020 to July 16, 2020 found that around 35% of the migrants went without any meal the whole day (Pandit, 2020 ).

The findings from some articles focused on circular migration and its adverse consequences ( n  = 5), while a few other articles reported the problems of discrimination faced by migrants belonging to the disadvantaged communities ( n  = 2). Some articles also emphasised the financial crisis created by this pandemic ( n  = 4), which was particularly acute for the migrants. All the studies shed light on the psychological issues faced by the migrants and among this, a few studies ( n  = 3) also suggested interventions for the migrants (Chander et al., 2020 ; Singh, 2020a , 2020b , 2020 c; Kumar et al., 2020 ). Many studies ( n  = 8) also pointed out the urgent need for revising the existing government-policies and taking new initiatives by the government for the betterment of the migrant workers.

Among the 15 studies, one study (Chander et al., 2020 ) reported visiting various spots across the city ( n  = 140), contacting around 5048 migrants and offering assistance to nearly 3944 migrants. In another study under the District Mental Health Program, Chandigarh, many migrants ( n  = 61) were attended to for their mental health issues and taken care of (Singh, 2020a , 2020b , 2020 c). In the same city, another study was carried out among migrants ( n  = 98), which found that the majority of the participants were facing one or the other mental health issues and made interventions on a limited scale (Kumar et al., 2020 ).

One of the key elements and an integral factor contributing to development among the human civilisation is migration (Nanda, 2020 ). Migration happens at both individual and community levels, and occurs due to multiple reasons such as the lookout for better job opportunities, improved living conditions and for enhanced productivity and thereby greater income (Raj, 1981 ; Shahare, 2020 ). Migration takes place based on the various vital resources that are available in the ecosystem (Ram, 2020 ). The practice of migration has happened from time immemorial and can be traced from the beginning of humanity, as it first existed in the form of nomads who moved in groups from one place to another in the lookout for better resources, and later on as invasions by various rulers (Rolland, 2020 ).

Migration is regarded as a continuous process that is common to all living beings (Virupaksha, 2014 ). There are two major types of migration: one that takes place within a country across a district or a state-border, which is known as internal or national migration; and the other a migration that involves crossing international borders, which is referred to as external or international migration (Bhagat, 2020a ). Migrants associated with these types of migration are called in-migrants and out-migrants respectively (Sinha, 2005 ). Further, based on the place of origin and destination, migration can be classified into four categories: (i) rural–rural, (ii) rural–urban, (iii) urban–urban and (iv) urban–rural (Amin, 2018 ; Kishore and Kiran, 2013 ). The types of labour migration can be broadly classified as (i) Permanent, (ii) Commuting, and (iii) Circular (Haas and Osland, 2014 ). Permanent refers to the situation when the migrant does not intend to return to their native lands. Commuting refers to the regular movement between an individual’s home and work, which is characterised by the separation between the workplace and residence (Colla et al., 2017 ). Circular migration is a situation where the migrants do not stay in the migrated lands forever but instead go back to their native lands after some time, and then might move again to a different place (Gomathi, 2014 ).

In general, the migrants go to their destinations to fulfil their livelihood/career aspirations and/or to satisfy their basic requirements, but they return to their places of origin after a certain period to settle down, which is a “circular” process (Ghosh, 1985 ). “Hence circular migration is viewed as a cyclic journey of the migrants, which encompasses with their living pattern in two worlds i.e., urban insecure employment and stable homeland” (Nanda, 2020 ).

According to the National Sample Survey (NSS) and the India Human Development Survey (IHDS), the migrant labourers are mainly from rural areas and come from very poor backgrounds and belong to the lower social classes like the Scheduled Castes (SC), Scheduled Tribes (ST) and Other Backward Classes (OBC) (Shahare, 2020 ). According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the inter-state migration in pursuit of an occupation every year around the world was estimated to be around 9 million, and this is acknowledged as “temporary, contingent and non-standard” in nature with minimal access to societal perks and labour privileges (Chander et al., 2020 , p.1). The administrative and socio-cultural barriers and the language differences in addition to geographical variance further hinder the process of migration (Aragona et al., 2020 ). The migrant workers are inclined to falling prey to adverse mental health impacts of various traumas created through interfaces of multiple factors such as, “abject poverty, malnutrition, cultural bereavement, loss of religious practices and social protection systems, malalignment with a new culture, coping with language difficulties, changes in identity, substance abuse, poor access to health-care, in addition to the poor living conditions and financial constraints”, as a result of migrating to a new state (Choudhari, 2020 , p. 5).

A large majority of the migrants are daily wagers who have low-income and poor living conditions that are dilapidated, unhygienic and scarce of basic amenities like clean water supply, and electricity (Kusuma et al., 2014 ). Most of the migrants are slum-dwellers with inadequate sanitation facilities and are forced to go for open defecation because of the lack of lavatories. As the migrants are not used to the food of the lands of their migration, many of them turn towards fast food centres, which deprives them of nutritious and healthy diets (Babu et al., 2017 ). The above-mentioned factors have made them susceptible to multiple physical and mental health problems (Chander et al., 2020 ). There are no government machinery, department, board or other direct administering body to address the grievances of these migrant workers; neither do they have any rights or privileges in the regions in which they work or in the villages to which they belong (Nirmala, 2020 ).

Upon the rise of the pandemic, the migrants were among the groups of victims who were acutely affected by the lockdown (Choudhari, 2020 ). These daily wagers are said to be the weakest and socially neglected community that forms the classic nobodies among Indian citizens (Shahare, 2020 ).

The migrants were trapped in their migrated lands, far away from their families and loved ones with minimal health-care facilities, poor living conditions, besides being devoid of a job and having no money or means to survive (Ram, 2020 ). The migrants are more likely to fall prey to various traumas emanating from all three domains- social, psychological, and emotional, which stem from the dread of being discriminated and ignored by the local community around them and the grave concerns that arise about the safety and comfort of their families in their native places (Kumar et al., 2020 ).

Circular migration, as a result of the pandemic, generated severe stress, tension, despair, addiction to substance use, and self-harm behaviour among the migrants. In addition, they had greater concerns that deeply affected them, such as, “uncertainty about the duration of the lockdown; desperate longing to travel and meet their families; fear of being abandoned/deserted by their employers; insecurity about job and income; acute distress that arose from their inability to look after the health issues of children and pregnant women” (Chander et al., 2020 , p. 2)

Desire to return to their homeland

Once the lockdown was implemented, the primary concern for most of the migrants was to return safely to their families. Being isolated from the families created more stress and tension among them and caused a lot of growing anxiety about the travel possibilities.

On 19th March 2020, the Indian Railways announced the sudden suspension of passenger trains and, as a consequence, there was a mass exodus of utterly terrified migrant workers. Thousands of migrant workers across Delhi and the National Capital Region (NCR) were seen carrying heavy baggage and wailing children walking on national highways, boarding tractors, and shoving each other around for seats in buses to leave for their homes. The government, upon understanding the problems of jobless migrants to access food and shelter, tried to reassure them by announcing an assistance by an extended scheme under the Prime Minister’s Garib Kalyan Yojana (PMGKY). This offered relief packages to the migrants and daily wagers with the aim of blocking any disruptions to their employment besides supporting small establishments. However, this initiative was not satisfactory, because despite these efforts of the government, a huge number of migrants spent restless nights without food, asylum and/or travel facilities (Nanda, 2020 ). Failure in the implementation of the government’s assurance to provide basic necessities such as food and water forced thousands of migrant labourers to flock to the city’s bus terminals (Singh, 2020a , 2020b , 2020 c). However, not everyone could get on a bus and leave for their homelands (Ram, 2020 ).

Since most of the public transport was suspended as part of COVID-19 safety precautions, the migrants were stuck at their place of work and felt completely miserable (Chander et al., 2020 ). Even though they were aware of the risks involved in travelling back to their hometowns, both for them and their families, most of them desperately longed to get back home. They believed that it would be comforting to be with their loved ones during this time of uncertainty of impending death and was increasingly impatient to travel back home. They yearned to go back, so much so that they were even willing to put up with the discomforts of the travel quarantine norms imposed by the government (Chander et al., 2020 ).

From surveys conducted by NGOs like Stranded Workers Action Network (SWAN), it was found that due to scarcity of money and food, many of the migrants had very little to eat and some were even on the brink of starvation (Staff, 2020 ; Shahare, 2020 ). Most of these migrants suffered hunger pangs and police brutality and hundreds of people died tragically enroute to their homelands during the pandemic (Santoshini, 2020 ).

Fear of losing job

As much intense was the desire of the migrants to go back to their families, so were their worries about losing their jobs. Millions of migrant labourers employed across various sectors like construction, agriculture, manufacturing, transport and other services were stuck in their migrant locations during the lockdown. Even those migrant labourers who did not lose their jobs, as they were employed in essential services, had to suffer from wage-cuts imposed by their employers. They were therefore worried over how they would meet their regular expenses like those on food, clothing, medicines and accommodation. For those who were away from their worksite for several days together, there was absolutely no job security, and this led to a mounting panic in them. On the other hand, those who lost their jobs had the additional worries about whether and how they could return to their hometowns. Owing to the prevailing travel restrictions and the non-availability of transport facilities, there was no certainty about whether and when they would be able to travel back. The dread of being forsaken by their employers and the creeping fear of being abandoned with no job, wages or place to stay was indeed a traumatic experience for them (Chander et al., 2020 ).

Financial distress

As per the certified employment valuation, Indian industries have millions of internal migrant staff who make significant contributions to the economy of India. (Deshingkar and Akter, 2009 ; Choudhari, 2020 ). Although India’s economic growth is dependent to a great extent on the cheap labour of such migrants who work for even less than the minimum wages, they remained unrewarded and obscure in Delhi and the National Capital Region (NCR), and were excluded from relief funds during the COVID-19 crisis (Shahare, 2020 ).

The International Labour Organization (2020) has observed that migrant labourers are the worst-hit by the current economic crisis. The costs of basic hygienic products necessary for individual security during the pandemic (such as detergents, soaps, sanitisers) have become prohibitively expensive and unaffordable for the migrants, because they were thrown out of their jobs and had no other sources of income (Srivastava, 2020 ). Many employers have either fired the migrant workers without any prior notice or have stopped paying them salaries. The financial crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has inflicted severe difficulties for the lower income families in meeting the costs of food, clothing and medicines (Mishra and Sayeed, 2020 ). Adding to the financial woes of the migrants, the NITI Aayog (a public policy think-tank of the Government of India) reduced food subsidies from 75 to 60% in rural areas and from 50 to 40% in urban areas (Gothoskar, 2021 ). Studies done on earlier recessions (Kumar et al., 2020 ) have pointed out that the work-loss during an economic crisis often leads to “longstanding unemployment and wage impediments, deteriorating or worsening the health of unemployed workers and thereby increasing poverty” (Khanna, 2020 , p. 3–4).

Quality of the relief camps

Not all migrants could travel back to their homelands before the lockdown. All those who were left behind were allotted food and accommodation by the government (Singh et al., 2020 ). Numerous labourers had to remain in extremely tiny and congested rooms with nearly nothing to live on. Seven to eight individuals were confined in a tiny room with practically no ventilation, and no appropriate space to cook food (Shahare, 2020 ).

In majority of the relief camps there were no essential facilities such as power, light, fan, latrines and water, and most of them were absolutely packed, and the old occupants were not permitting new ones to come in. Consequently, there were a lot of fights, maltreatments and bullying among the migrant groups (Shahare, 2020 ).

The anxiety of catching the disease, as described in the words of a Dalit migrant as a personal experience account was such, “that we were scared that we might get infected with the virus because there was a COVID-19 positive patient in my neighbouring street … we did not want to stay anymore in Mumbai because we were anxious of getting the infection through using the public toilet or sharing food because we lived in a slum and we don’t have separate toilet and housing; thus we decided that now we shall return to our village” (Pankaj, 2020 , p. 5). Although the government had allotted food and shelter for the migrants, it was found that in most of the shelter homes and relief camps people did not receive sufficient quantity and quality food on time. They had to wait for three to four hours in long queues since morning for their meals. Thousands of calls related to scarcity of food were made to the police from these camps on a daily basis (Shahare, 2020 ).

Shortages in the allotted rations

The report by SWAN that was released on 15th April 2020, stated that, “only 51%, of who were surveyed, had rations left for less than one day” (Farooqui and Pandey, 2020 ). It further observed that, “two weeks into the lockdown, only 1% of the stranded workers had received rations from the government, and three weeks into the lockdown, 96% of the migrants had not received rations from the government at all, 70% had not received any cooked food, 78% had less than Rs.300 left with them and 89% had not been paid by their employers at all during the lockdown” (Shahare, 2020 , p. 6). The distribution of rations was on the basis of the person possessing a ration card, but most of the migrants did not have a permanent residence or necessary legal documents, and therefore were unable to get a ration card.

This distribution system became faulty due to the lack of an inter-state portable ration cards acceptable in all states. The impact of this problem has got aggravated, as a large section of the migrants neither have a valid ID proof nor have been registered under any special schemes set up for them. Although the government has enacted the Inter-State Migrant Workmen Act, 1979 to facilitate the lives and work of migrant labourers, it has remained ineffective due to poor implementation, as per the reports of the Standing Committee on Labour (PRS India, 2020).

An article in The New Indian Express , published on 29 March 2020, reported that about 200 migrant workers belonging to the Soliga tribe were stranded at coffee estates in a village of Kodagu (formerly known as Coorg) district in the Indian state of Karnataka and were running out of food and were living in awful conditions (Chakma, 2020 ). On the publication of this article, the government of Karnataka reached out to them and distributed rations of rice and pluses and other necessary food products like eggs, ghee and edible oil to the tribal families (Chakma, 2020 ).

The Delhi Government has developed shelter homes, quarantine homes and relief camps for the migrants and are taking care of about 600,000 individuals, besides providing food to more than 2.2 million migrants under their Free Ration Scheme, facilitated by the One Nation One Ration Card Scheme of the Government of India. Despite this, millions of migrants are still excluded from these schemes and have not received any help from the Government (Mukhra, 2020 ).

Insufficient health-care facilities

The migrant population including mothers, children, and pregnant women, were deeply apprehensive about their well-being, and had serious concerns about their health inside the shelter homes. This group at large was already predisposed to communicable diseases due to their malnutrition, socio-economic status, occupational hazards, and the poor living conditions (Choudhari, 2020 ). The deplorable conditions in the relief camps prevented them from following any basic safety precautions like practising social distancing, regular washing of hands, use of sanitiser and masks, that each individual was required to do as part of the standard procedure for fighting COVID-19. Unfortunately, practising these measures was extremely difficult or impossible in their crowded and ill-equipped camp-accommodations, and this has put the group at great risk of contracting the disease (Andrade, 2020 ; Chander et al., 2020 ). Even the symptoms of common cold, such as “fever, cough and throat pain” among the people were feared as Covid-infections, which threw everyone into a panic and caused a lot of bitter resentment amongst those living in the community (Chander et al., 2020 ).

Hardships of women in the camps

Female migrant workers confronted daunting challenges while living along with unknown men in these shelter homes. One major problem was in using the common toilets with them, which was highly unhygienic and likely to cause infections under the prevailing pandemic conditions. There was no privacy or protection available for the women during day or night. The plight of pregnant women was particularly miserable as they were greatly inconvenienced in these camps and shelter-homes. There were no facilities for regular medical check-up by doctors or for taking scans or conducting the necessary tests.

It was found in one of the surveys that nearly 42% of the pregnant migrant women did not receive any medical check-ups during the lockdown (Pandit, 2020 ). All these were highly disconcerting for the women who were forced to live in these camps (Shahare, 2020 ).

Withdrawal symptoms

Majority of the migrants use one or the other type of substances such as tobacco or alcohol. Therefore, the non-availability of these products during the lockdown has led to severe withdrawal symptoms in many of them. In a study conducted in Bangalore (Chander et al., 2020 ) a few migrants spoke out that they all have become “sober” due to non-availability of alcohol and other substances. Some of them even spoke about their withdrawal issues, which caused a lot of frustration in them and resulted in relationship problems, domestic violence, and psychiatric illnesses. Heavier alcohol usage and criminal sexual behaviour have been reported in communities of predominantly single men compared to those living with their families.

Psychological issues

The poor living conditions of the migrants the shortages for the basic necessities have caused severe mental stress to many of them, which got manifested in their lives in the form of relationship problems, substance abuse, alcoholism, sexual exploitation, domestic violence, and psychiatric illnesses (NACP III, 2007 ; Kumar et al., 2020 ). Adding further to the burden of the awful shock wave of physical distress caused by the pandemic, there was a gigantic wave of psychological issues among migrant labourers, with deaths due to suicides as its lead sign (Singh, 2020a , 2020b , 2020 c). Suicidal tendencies were provoked among the migrants, as they lived constantly under severe financial worries, loneliness, anxiety, fear, and feelings of hopelessness and isolation (Choudhari, 2020 ). The constant fear of an impending doom of a completely dark future has further intensified their psychological distress and discomfort.

With the imposition of the lockdown, not all were able to go back to their homelands. Instead, they were stranded in the migrant lands with no income but only uncertainty about travelling back home, which made them mentally disturbed and agitated (Singh, 2020a , 2020b , 2020 c). As all the workplaces were shut down, there was an increasing panic about whether and when they would be reopened. Even if the workplaces are reopened, there was no guarantee that all the former employees would be hired back. There was a lingering fear in the minds of these displaced workers that the recession in the aftermath of the pandemic would result in large scale firing of employees. This fear and distress accompanied the migrants who travelled to their native lands and at the same time restrained some of them from going back to their native lands (Nanda, 2020 ).

The living conditions of the migrants also induced distress and concern as they were heavily crammed up and unhygienic, which was the complete opposite of an ideal place to be in during the pandemic. The fear and agony of living in such harsh conditions and the lingering uncertainty about the future gave rise to many psychiatric issues among them, such as anxiety disorders and substance abuse. In a study on migrants, it was found that there is increased risk for the manifestation of schizophrenia and related non affective psychosis among first- and second-generation migrants (Henssler et al., 2019 ). As most of the migrants belonged to the socio-economically backward classes, they are subjected to much inequity and prejudice from the people in the migrant lands, and were never able to fit in with the new surroundings. Studies from the clinical psychology perspective have found that experiencing discrimination and social exclusion has led to increased rates of psychotic experiences among migrants (Mishra and Sayeed, 2020 ).

In most of the cases of the migrants, the absence of a caretaker or a family member with them has caused an unceasing feeling of loneliness and frustration (Zhou et al., 2020 ). There was also a continuous feeling of helplessness caused by their inability to meet the livelihood and health requirements of their families, living away in their homelands. This has greatly deepened their agony of being stuck far away from home (Choudhari, 2020 ).

Apart from causing harmful effects on the body, the virus has the ability to inflict longstanding psychological disorders such as “depression, anxiety, panic disorder, and psychosomatic manifestations” (Qiu et al., 2020 , p. 2). There were several reported attempts of self-harm and suicides by the migrants (Singh, 2020a , 2020b , 2020 c). The pathetic situation they are in and the ambiguity about the extent of the crisis created a panic response among the migrants and made them act out frantically. The nagging anxiety levels that were mounting among the masses day by day led them to set out on their travel on foot for several hundred miles in order to reach their destinations, their homelands, with no facility of food or shelter during the journey (Choudhari, 2020 ).

Although the mental-distress cases were escalating, it was noticed that there was a drastic decline in the number of patients (both new and follow up cases) visiting the psychiatric outpatient services after the lockdown. Apparently, the reluctance to visit the clinics was out of the fear of contracting the virus. However, the danger of ignoring any psychological treatment at a time when they are estimated to be rising holds the possibilities of adverse effects on the efficacy of treatment. In addition, the considerable decline in follow-up visits also paves way to the threat of relapse (Aragona et al., 2020 ).

Racial discrimination of the North Eastern migrants

It was reported by the Rights and Risks Analysis Group (RRAG) on 26 March 2020, that, during the time-period from 7th February 2020 to 25 th March 2020, there were twenty-two incidents (in different parts of the country) of racial discrimination and assaults against individuals from the North East (Chakma, 2020 ). They were called names such as “Corona”, “Chinese”, and “Chinki”, and were glared at, along with shouting of expletives. India’s mongoloid looking citizens were subjected to insults while they were strolling on the roads, doing their shopping or travelling in trains and buses. They were called “Covid”, and coercively isolated, even though they had negative COVID-19 certificates. They were denied entry into public places, and were driven out of eateries and shared transports.

Psychosocial issues

The high levels of anxiety and stress induced among the general public by the lockdown during this pandemic was felt more intensely among the migrants, leading to many more psychosocial issues among them. The stress generated in the migrants made them behave in socially unacceptable ways and caused panic attacks on them. Consequently, they started fleeing hastily from the migrant lands. In order to go back to their home states at the earliest, they started crowding at the local bus stands and railway stations in desperation, ignoring all lockdown rules. This reckless behaviour of violating the norms of preventive measures resulted in the perpetual vicious cycle of being exposed to infection, quarantine, distress and hostilities (Choudhari, 2020 ). Although the most pressing need for all migrants at that time was the immediate return to their homelands from the migrant lands, the reverse migration came with a lot of appalling hardships and several other related problems (Tandon, 2020 ; Wong et al., 2019 ; Chakma, 2020 ).

Issues of reverse migration

Owing to circular migration or reverse migration, there was an acute shortage of workers in the urban areas from where the migrant workers had left for their homelands (Srivastava, 2020 ). This shortage, combined with the new relaxed laws in both occupational and industrial health, compelled the available local workers to work for longer durations than what was actually expected of them, which was in fact against the Factories Act of 1948 (Rivera et al., 2020 ; Wong et al., 2019 ). As a result, there was a drastic decline in the resting hours of the workers, which in turn led to the rise in stress and burnout among them and made them more prone to mental health issues (Choudhari, 2020 ).

The phenomenon of reverse migration has a bigger effect on the indigenous communities in the migrant lands as well. Reverse migration can mop out endangered indigenous Indian communities’ inhabitants and eternally ruin the subsistence of several such communities. As there were millions of people belonging to outside communities, such as those from the North East, have migrated to the urban cities in search of work in unorganised sectors, the lockdown induced re-migration would adversely affect the urban economies for want of labourers, as well as lead to the destruction of the economy of the migrants’ homelands because of the loss of jobs and income for those families and the resultant food and hunger crisis (Chakma, 2020 ).

The problems of the migrants did not cease to exist even after their reverse migration to their homelands. On reaching back to their homelands, their problems were mainly about staying in quarantine and the difficulties associated with it (Mishra and Sayeed, 2020 ).

Issues with quarantine after reverse migration

As part of the travel protocol prescribed for the pandemic-times, all migrants going back to their homelands were expected to be tested for COVID-19 and were expected to stay in self-isolation or quarantine at their homeland-residences for a minimum of fourteen days. Most of the migrants come from poor backgrounds with only a single room in their houses. Under this situation, they had to spend their quarantine period outside their houses. It was reported that in the Purulia district of West Bengal, some migrants spent their quarantine period outside the village limits by sleeping under trees, inside trucks or buses, or in make-shift shelters (Chakma, 2020 ). Similarly, in the Siwan area of Bihar, the labourers who managed to arrive at their hometowns were placed in extremely small spaces behind an iron gate in an infectious condition. To their good fortune, they were rescued from there on the following day and were transported in trucks to the isolation centres of their respective panchayats (Mishra and Sayeed, 2020 ).

Since the panchayat-shelters were also makeshift arrangements, there were very few protective measures provided to the residents. As the migrants were crowded in these shelters in high concentration, there was a significant risk of infection. In most places, the migrant labourers were stuck in these makeshift camps for many days, with poor infrastructure and inadequate food supply (Mishra and Sayeed, 2020 ).

Since the imposition of the lockdown, the media has featured several stories of the pathetic situation of the migrant labourers in various parts of the country. In the Bareli district of Uttar Pradesh, many migrants including women and children were forcefully pushed to clean themselves up in chemical baths as a sanitisation measure (Sammadar, 2020 ).

In general, the overall condition of the migrants was inexpressibly pathetic. Their worries and adversities did not come to an end. From being stuck in the lockdown in migrant lands to going through the difficulties of reverse migration and the struggles of survival, battling through quarantine and financial crisis during the pandemic-time was a fierce combat they had to wage while trying to stay alive and safe from the risk of starvation and infection.

This paper is an attempt to assess (based on published research papers) the plight of the migrants during the Covid crisis, in terms of their economic, social and health conditions. It brought into limelight the adversities, vulnerabilities, as well as the physical and psychological distresses and discriminations faced by the migrants under the onslaught of this pandemic in the Indian context, along with the problems of the resultant circular migration. From the survey of the 15 selected studies, it was clear that most of the problems faced by the migrants were due to them having been stranded in the migrated lands due to the lockdown. They were stuck in relief camps that had poor living conditions, with no job or income and, therefore, no means to travel back to their homelands. They became vulnerable to many physical and psychological illnesses, and received hardly any medical care from the government. In addition to suffering from the lack of basic physical facilities and the scarcity in the allocated resources, they also faced social issues such as discrimination and attacks from the local people.

Owing to the unpredictable nature of the pandemic and the uncertain turns it was taking with the passage of time, there was no end in sight for the crisis, and so the migrants couldn’t expect any relief from this tragic situation they were locked down in. The government launched several initiatives for the welfare of the migrants. One of them is the “The Aatma Nirbhar Bharat Abhiyaan”, through which they distributed free food grains for migrant workers without ration cards for a period of 2 months. Another government program was the “Affordable Rental Housing Complexes for Migrant Workers and Urban Poor”, which provided affordable rental housing units under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PRSIndia, 2020 ). Although there were many such initiatives by the government, most of them were poorly implemented, and therefore, they became non-functional and failed to reach the entire migrant population.

Through the present study, the authors conclude that, based on the evaluation of the factors affecting the migrants, it is necessary to adopt immediate interventions for the welfare of the migrants.

Recommendations

One of the most pressing needs of the migrants is to have access to health services, which are equitable, non-discriminatory, and appropriate according to age and gender. In order to ensure maximum effectiveness, these measures must be people-centred and migrant sensitive, so as to deliver services that are culturally and linguistically appropriate because migrants are different from the people in the migrated lands, as they are subjected to different kinds of distress and exploitation.

Additionally, addressing and improving the mental health of the migrants are extremely necessary. Providing regular facilities such as in-person counselling, tele-counselling, therapies and psychosocial services is a necessity. In addition to this, systematic assessments must be conducted for early detection of and early interventions for any mental disorders among the migrants. Forming a strong ethical alliance between the local population, health systems, local government, and human rights associations to ensure the welfare of these migrants is also necessary. Furthermore, it is vitally important to prevent the spread of any fake news about the virus and to convey evidence-based accurate information to the public.

A major issue that calls for special attention is the well-being of women and children among the migrants. Women should be provided adequate services for maintaining reproductive health, maternal health, postnatal care, paediatric care and preventive/remedial measures for dealing with domestic or sexual abuse. These services must be focused on risk assessment and treatment for improving their health conditions and must not be used to screen out their health issues; nor should they be used as a tool for discrimination or for enforcing any restrictions. The migrant community must also be given priority for vaccination by the local administrations because of their particular vulnerability to the virus-infection. Furthermore, since the major cause for their health issues is the deplorable living conditions of the relief camps, the respective state governments should take the necessary steps to improve the living conditions in all relief camps.

It is essential to monitor health-care practices of the migrants and generate a repository of relevant health-care information during the pandemic period, which can be used to support future studies on the health issues of migrants during any Covid-like pandemics. Moreover, this will also facilitate sharing of health-related information between states, so as to facilitate the implementation of effective treatment strategies for migrants from various places.

A major social issue among the migrants is their fear of losing their jobs, income and housing. On these matters also it is the governments that can help, as they can take unbiased actions in case of any exploitation or labour complaints regarding their right to stay and work. It will also be of help if assistance is provided to the migrants to form associations and cooperative societies to support the livelihood of those who have returned to their native lands.

In view of the need to effectively manage the health issues of the migrants, it is necessary to give special attention to the migrants’ housing facilities, as their present unhygienic living conditions are a breeding ground for innumerable diseases. Government initiatives like The Aatma Nirbhar Bharat Abhiyaan, must be properly implemented. Similarly, NGOs and aid agencies should be persuaded to raise funds to construct affordable housing units, which should be made available to migrants for minimal rents (PRSIndia, 2020 ). For migrants who are not able to afford even these minimum-rental houses, the relief camps must be kept open with better facilities for a longer period.

Another social issue as explained in the SWAN report is the irregular and uneven distribution of basic necessities among the migrants (Shahare, 2020 ). Hence, there is a need for a universal and uniform mechanism for the distribution of both financial aid and essential items such as grains, medicines, and water to the migrant families. In order to ensure efficient distribution of financial aid and basic necessities among the migrants, it will be a good idea to entrust this work to the respective “panchayats” (the Indian local administrative councils operating at the village, block and district levels) to register and enrol these migrants and distribute these resources to them as per their eligibilities. Since they are already facing severe financial difficulties, subsidies must be increased as opposed to initiatives like NITI Aayog (Gothoskar, 2021 ).

A major political issue faced by the migrants is the absence of a body or agency to represent them in the respective state governments of the migrated lands. Since the migrants are only entitled to vote in their home constituency, and not in their migrated states, their political clout is limited and therefore their voices are rarely heard (Deshingkar and Akter, 2009 ). In order to present their demands and concerns to the governmental agencies, they have to be a part of a legitimate political system, which is authorised to represent them in these migrated lands.

There is an immediate need to push for a pro-migrant attitude in the general society, a better acknowledgement of the contribution of the migrants to the society, and the adoption of a proactive role in educating them and safeguarding their labour rights. This study further emphasises the urgent need to revise the national migration policies, which should help assist and protect the migrants and the returnee migrants who are either travelling from or to the areas affected by the pandemic.

Limitations

One of the main limitations of the reviewed studies was the inability to make any alterations with the brief interactive interventions with the migrants as their distress levels were much higher. These studies were restricted due to being retrospective single-centre studies and so generalising these findings across all services are difficult.

This review limited its focus to migrant workers alone and passed over the similar issues faced by the emigrants who have returned to the country post lockdown and also on the immigrants who were stuck in the country due to the lockdown rules and regulations. These two groups also have undergone trauma along the same lines as the migrant workers group and, therefore, future studies focusing on these are highly relevant and in need.

Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study were derived from the databases (PubMed, Scopus, PsychNet, and Google Scholar) available in the public domain.

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Jesline, J., Romate, J., Rajkumar, E. et al. The plight of migrants during COVID-19 and the impact of circular migration in India: a systematic review. Humanit Soc Sci Commun 8 , 231 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-021-00915-6

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Millions of people around the world are on the move, trying to adapt to life in countries not their own. In some cases this movement is voluntary, as people search for better life opportunities, education, or work. In many more cases, however, the migration is forced, as people flee poverty, civil unrest, and war, or as they search for employment that will simply allow them to survive.

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Mothers in Hong Kong

“my son didn't recognize me” dolores, “why do you look after other kids” catalina magno, “i never felt the distance” divina valdez, “i was heavily in debt” allyn alcala frades, children in the philippines, “mom's visits were like a fantasy” francis tumpalan, “she's finally with us, then cancer happened” krizzel orpilla, “i love her more for her sacrifice” vivien leigh ortiz, “she called me every day” israel manuel, when love is not enough, millions of filipinos work abroad to support their families back home. eight mothers and children share their stories of separation, by jessie yeung and xyza cruz bacani, cnn.

No mother wants to leave her child — but in the Philippines, it can feel like there’s no other choice. Unable to earn enough money at home, an estimated 2.2 million Filipinos worked overseas last year, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority . The majority were women, many hoping to give their child a better future.

They work as nurses, hospitality staff, nannies and cleaners. Last year, they sent $33.5 billion back to the Philippines in personal remittances -- a record high, according to the country’s central bank.

More than 2.2 million Filipinos worked overseas in 2019 The top five destinations were in Asia and the Middle East

Source: Philippines Statistics Authority

But their income comes at a high personal cost. Mothers can miss out on entire childhoods. Sometimes their relationship with their children remains damaged and distant, years after they return. Other times, their children’s lives can veer off course without a parent at home.

In Hong Kong, the vast majority of Filipino migrants are domestic workers, often raising other people’s children. CNN spoke with several of these women, and adults who grew up in the Philippines without their mothers, about the emotional toll of being separated for years.

CNN interviewed some of these mothers and children Select an image to read their story

Dolores “my son didn't recognize me”.

Dolores can count on one hand the number of times she has seen her seven-year-old son.

She left him with his grandmother in the Philippines when he was six months old — she needed to return to work in Hong Kong to earn income to support them, as well as her niece and other family members. Her husband worked overseas, too.

Without much annual leave or the funds to travel, Dolores, who asked to be identified only by her first name for privacy reasons, didn’t see her son again until he was two-and-a-half years old.

“It’s difficult -- you left your son not knowing you,” she said. “He doesn’t know anything about you. Then you come back, and he can talk, he can run, but he doesn’t recognize you.”

Those first years were heartbreaking. Dolores could only afford two long-distance phone calls a week, because her family didn’t have internet access at home. She would call late at night after finishing work, just to listen to her son babble.

Dolores shows a picture of her son, who lives in the Philippines. Credit: Jessie Yeung

Things have gotten easier over the years. Now, her family has internet access and they make video calls three times a day. But she still worries it isn’t enough. “How can I nurture my child, considering that he’s in the Philippines?” she said. “When he comes home from school, I can’t teach him his homework.”

She felt the distance most two years ago, when her son was hospitalized for an ear blockage. Neither Dolores nor her husband were able to return home, and could only talk to their son over the phone after his operation was finished.

“I had a heavy heart that I was not there (while) he had to undergo the operation,” she said. “We were crying, because your son is telling you it’s painful, and you can’t comfort him. Of course, we are calling (on the phone), but it’s different if you’re beside (him).”

The reasons they leave

In the Philippines, high birth rates have created a labor force that’s growing faster than the economy can create jobs. Unemployment has pushed many to go abroad to find work.

In Hong Kong, there are almost 400,000 domestic workers, the majority of whom are women from the Philippines. They get paid at least $600 (29,500 pesos) a month – far higher than the average nominal wage in the Philippines of about $213 (10,460 pesos) a month, according to the International Labour Organization.

These conditions, which have persisted for decades, push more than a million Filipinos to leave the country every year for work abroad, according to the International Labour Organization (ILO). The additional income provides much-needed security -- not just for children’s education, but for other crucial needs like medical costs or recovery from natural disasters.

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte praised these workers for their economic contribution at a 2019 event . But the migration of Filipino workers has also left millions of children without a parent at home.

Rodrigo Duterte President of the Philippines

Francis Tumpalan “Mama’s visits were like a fantasy”

Francis Tumpalan doesn’t remember his mother leaving home; he was only four years old at the time. What he does remember is being raised by his grandparents and wearing wrinkled uniforms to school.

His mother’s visits, which came once every two years, were bittersweet, he said -- it always felt like “living in a fantasy” that he knew wouldn’t last long.

His mother’s sacrifices did provide him with opportunities. He went to college, though he says he spent more time hanging out with his friends and girlfriend than studying, and regrets dropping out before graduating.

Tumpalan is now 22, and his mother still works in Hong Kong. They talk every night, swapping stories about their days and about his young daughter, Phoebe. These long conversations have brought them closer, and help him understand why she left so many years ago.

Francis Tumpalan with his wife and daughter at home in Bambang, Nueva Vizcaya, Philippines. Credit: Xyza Cruz Bacani

“Mama’s sacrifices are worth it because she provided (for) my needs, but I dream of her to come home for good and hope that I can also give her a better life someday,” he said.

His mother declined to speak with CNN due to a busy work schedule.

Francis hopes his job at an automobile shop, along with the small store his wife runs, will earn enough for both of them to stay in the Philippines -- and allow his mother to save money for her own return, now that she no longer has to support him.

“It’s difficult to grow up without a mother … I want Phoebe to grow up in a complete family,” he said. “A simple life is okay as long as we are complete.”

The dream of education

TED ALJIBE/AFP via Getty Images

JAY DIRECTO/AFP via Getty Images

Catalina Magno “Why do you look after other kids?”

Catalina Magno and her husband both lost their jobs in 2001, and watched their savings drain away over months of unemployment. Struggling to provide for their two sons, Magno found a job in Hong Kong and left the children, one and four years old at the time, with their father.

She had one goal -- to earn enough to fund their education through college. It’s what “every mother dreams about,” she said.

But over the years, her children asked why she wasn’t home. When her son was six, he said, “Why do you look after other kids but you can’t look after us?” said Magno, who visited home twice a year -- more than many other domestic workers can afford.

Magno declined to be photographed for this piece.

Her sons are 21 and 23 now. Both got into college to study engineering, as she had desperately hoped, but dropped out before graduating. Magno was devastated. “At first, I didn’t believe it,” she said. “It’s tough, it’s very tough.”

One now works at a call center. The other is “working online,” but she isn’t completely sure what that means since “he doesn’t talk about it.” She still doesn’t know why they dropped out. Her relationship with her sons is still marked by a sense of distance and resignation.

When asked if she would have come to Hong Kong all those years ago if she had known her sons wouldn’t finish college, her answer was immediate.

“No, of course not,” she said. “My goal to go abroad was to earn money to send them to school. That was the only goal.”

The tragic reality

Xyza Cruz Bacani

Krizzel Orpilla “She was finally with us, then cancer happened”

Krizzel Orpilla was on a family holiday when she got her first menstrual period as a young girl.

Most girls turn to their mothers for guidance, but Orpilla didn’t feel like she could tell her mother, Divina Valdez, who had left when she was 10 years old to work in Taiwan and Hong Kong.

“My mother was on vacation with us but I cannot really tell her because I feel like there is a wall between us, because she was not always around,” said Orpilla, who was raised by her grandparents. Instead, she sought out her older sister, who filled the gap and “acted like a mother” as they grew up.

Top: A photo of Divina Valdez, her husband, and their employers’ children in Taiwan. Bottom: Krizzel celebrating a birthday without her parents. Credit: Xyza Cruz Bacani

The feeling of estrangement lingered after Valdez returned to the Philippines permanently in 2003, when Orpilla was about 15. But everything changed a year later, when Valdez was diagnosed with colon cancer.

“I felt cheated because it’s the only time that she is finally with us -- then the cancer happened,” said Orpilla, now 32.

They caught the cancer early and Valdez recovered, but the experience made Orpilla realize that she needed to “forgive her and be close to her to make up for the lost time.”

It was difficult for Orpilla to resolve the unfulfilled longing for her mother’s presence during childhood, especially since they aren’t the type to have heart-to-hearts. “We never really talked about it,” she said.

But living together, and having Valdez care for Orpilla’s own children, helped their relationship to heal over time. “When I became a mother, I realized how brave my mother is,” Orpilla said.

Divina Valdez “I never felt the distance”

Divina Valdez, Krizzel Orpilla’s mother, never planned to work overseas -- but as her kids grew older, she worried she wouldn’t have enough money to send them all to school, especially when the family farm flooded and cost the family its income.

So, she left the Philippines when Orpilla was 10 years old, and spent the next six years working in Taiwan and Hong Kong. Her husband left as well, finding work in various countries.

She missed her children all the time. But, unlike Orpilla, Valdez never felt like there was distance between them.

Divina Valdez’s old Hong Kong ID card from when she used to work in the city. Credit: Xyza Cruz Bacani

“I wrote to them weekly and they reply,” she said. “When I come home, they always miss me.”

Her decision to work abroad paid off in some ways. With higher incomes and savings, the family was able to build a bigger home in the Philippines. More importantly, all three kids graduated college; the eldest is now an engineer, the middle child a teacher, and Orpilla is a nurse. Their success, achieved even without their parents by their side, made Valdez “really proud,” she said.

Now that she has settled back home and is cancer-free, Valdez enjoys spending time with her grandchildren -- and closing the chasm with Orpilla she never realized was there.

“I make up for the lost time with Krizzel by taking care of her children,” she said.

The risk of exploitation

A survey of 5,023 domestic workers last year found that 15% had been physically abused during employment and 2% reported being sexually assaulted or harassed. Nearly half said they worked more than 16 hours a day; Hong Kong has no laws around maximum working hours per day or week.

Domestic workers in Hong Kong report high rates of poor working and living conditions

Source: Mission for migrant workers, 2019

Other complaints include not being given enough food to eat, not having a proper bed or privacy at night, and being asked to work on their days off.

But for some, the hardest part of the job is being separated from their children.

Vivien Leigh Ortiz “I love her more for her sacrifice”

As a child, Vivien Leigh Ortiz was always envious of her classmates. They all had mothers at home, who attended school events and bought them nice clothes. Ortiz’s mother left when she was five, and she was raised by her father.

As she grew up, she got used to her mother’s absence -- but childhood envy shifted into adolescent rebellion. When her mother sent home money for supplies, Ortiz would often spend it on food and drinks for her friends.

Her mother paid for college, but Ortiz didn’t put much effort into studying -- she changed her major four times, dropped out at one point, and took eight years to finish her degree in teaching and education.

Only as she grew older, got married and had three kids did she begin to regret “all the time and money” she “wasted.”

Decades later, her mother — who declined to speak with CNN — is still working in Hong Kong.

Determined not to let her mother’s hardship go to waste, Ortiz is pursuing a master’s degree in education in the Philippines, with financial support from her mother. She hopes it’ll help her find a teaching job overseas and earn enough money to give her children greater opportunities — an echo of her own mother’s dream. Even if she can’t go abroad, the degree could still help her secure a better job in the Philippines.

“I feel that Mama’s sacrifice is still not worth it until I’m done,” she said.

She knows that leaving might be difficult for her children -- but says “the situation is different” because she separated from her husband last year. “I have three kids, I’m a single mother and I need to support them … I want to give my children a better life.”

Allyn Alcala Frades “I was heavily in debt”

Allyn Alcala Frades found herself heavily in debt after graduating college. She’d wanted to be a teacher, but was unable to find a well-paying job in her Philippines hometown, and couldn’t afford to raise two children as a single mother.

So, two years ago, she followed in her cousins’ footsteps and found employment hundreds of miles away in Hong Kong as a domestic worker -- a job that combines housekeeping, cooking and childcare. As she works, she thinks of her children.

“When I planned for their education, I (thought), what if they take higher-cost education? What can I give them if I don’t have money?” said Frades, 35. Her twin sons are only 10, but she wants them to have options -- unlike herself, her cousins, and her sister, who also left to work in Hong Kong.

She sends home at least 10,000 Philippine pesos (about $204) each month -- about a third of her monthly minimum wage salary.

Allyn Alcala Frades shows a photo of her children in the Philippines. Credit: Jessie Yeung

“Maybe if I can save up enough for their future, they won’t need to go to other countries to work,” she said. “If they have families, they can take care of their families.”

She tries to be there for them from afar. During weekly video calls, she tells them to brush their teeth and eat their vegetables, mindful that their father died of diabetes. Still, she’s sometimes hit with guilt that she can’t take them to school or cook their meals -- all the things a mother traditionally does in the Philippines.

“But then I think, this is for them,” she said.

Israel Manuel “She called me every day”

Israel Manuel was two years old when his mother left, first to work in Singapore then in Hong Kong.

He was raised by his father and grandparents -- but despite the distance, he always felt closer to his mother. He was an only child, and loved spending time with her during her annual visits home. Once social media became widely accessible, they called each other every day.

Manuel’s mother played an active role in his life, gently steering him towards his studies instead of video games in high school. It paid off -- he got into college, and is now a criminology student.

He also felt her presence through gifts. Throughout his childhood, she would send games, new clothes and toys like soldier figurines and miniature car models. This year, she bought him a real vehicle -- a motorbike, as a gift “for being a good son,” he said. He loves the bike, rides it every day and often spends time diligently cleaning it.

“I feel that it’s a way for my mother to make me feel her love,” said Manuel, now 20.

But, he added, he hopes she will return home once her current job contract ends.

Photo essay: In the Philippines, women migrant workers rebuild lives, advocate for each other

Date: 16 September 2016

A global programme by UN Women, “Promoting and Protecting Women Migrant Workers’ Labour and Human Rights”, supported by the European Union and piloted in the Philippines, works to build the capacities of migrant women’s organizations and networks to better serve and assist women migrant workers. UN Women spoke with migrant women returnees and community leaders from La Union province, over 260 miles from Manila, where the programme supports various migrant women’s organizations. These are their stories.

“I migrated to the Middle East as a domestic worker because my husband was about to lose his job due to poor health. I worked long work hours—I was the only domestic worker for a household of ten—and endured verbal abuse. There was a time that I didn’t receive any salary for several months…,” shares 55-year old Virginia Carriaga.

After two years of abuse, Carriaga escaped from her last work place in Lebanon, and sought assistance from the Philippines Embassy. Prior to her repatriation, in the two months that she spent at the Embassy-sponsored shelter in Beirut, she became a spokesperson for other women migrant workers. Today, Carriaga is a successful business woman, owner of a variety store in Balaoan, with the assistance and trainings that she received from the government and women migrant workers’ organizations.

Primitiva Vanderpoorten, a retired nurse who worked in the United Kingdom for several years, invested her income in properties in her home country. Today she offers her resort hotel in Luna as a venue for meetings of Bannuar Ti La Union, an organization for women migrant workers, where she is a member: “Even as a nurse, I experienced offensive remarks from patients. They would ask why I was in their country and that I should go back to my country.”

“My son did not finish high school and got involved in delinquent activities. He resented me for leaving him in Philippines. Have I been a bad mother, I asked myself,” shares Virginia Estepa, a 62-year-old former woman migrant worker who now works as a health worker at the barangay (smallest unit in the community) in Naguilian. Like many others, Estepa migrated overseas to provide for her family. As women migrate for work, leaving behind their children, the social cost of the impact on their children is often less known or understood. Research shows that fathers, grandmothers and the extended families care for children left behind.

UN Women’s programme, piloting in three countries—Philippines, Mexico and Moldova—provides trainings to organizations and women migrant workers’ groups to strengthen their advocacy skills, knowledge on migrant women’s rights, organizational development, strategic planning and enterprise governance. Women migrant workers’ organizations and groups have been instrumental in providing information that enables women to migrate safely and know how to report abuse or seek assistance.

The training on organizational development was particularly useful for Carmelita Nulledo, 52, a former domestic worker from Singapore and Hong Kong and now a farmer and volunteer in various organizations. “From the action planning during our training, we have proceeded with mapping and simple surveys in the community. This will generate data about migrant women and inform any local planning and policies to address the needs of women migrant workers,” she shares. Like many of the migrant women impacted by the project, Nulledo volunteers at the local assistance desks for migrant workers and their families. “I had a positive migration experience, and now I am motivated to help others, she adds.

Women migrant workers’ organizations in the Philippines also provide reintegration assistance to returnee women migrants by providing livelihood and business trainings, and helping them access assistance programmes, such as scholarship for education and training, enterprise development funds, business counseling, legal and psychosocial services provided by the government under the national law and through local ordinances.

Delilah Dulay, 40, works as a master cutter at the Aringay Bannuar Garments Production, which is funded by the Department of Labour and Employment and the local government of Aringay in La Union province and provides decent work for migrant women returnees. Dulay had migrated to Qatar to improve her income. She landed with a domestic worker’s job where she barely slept for two hours every day and was paid significantly less than the salary she was promised. Upon her return to La Union, Dulay underwent trainings through Bannuar Ti La Union as part of the UN Women project and learned about her rights and gained skills as a garment worker.

“Being a member of a women migrant workers’ group helps me and the others find our confidence in facing day to day life and its challenges. We have a common bond stemming from similar experiences,” she says.

Edna Valdez, 58, worked for four years as a domestic worker in Hong Kong under harsh conditions. Today, she is the President of Bannuar Ti La Union. “The main challenge for women migrant workers is that they don’t know what rights they have. Even when there are laws and services in place, they don’t know how to claim their rights or access support. That’s why we lobby the local government units to set up Migrant Desks at each municipal office, in compliance with the national law, where migrants and their families can access information and support,” says Valdez.

Today, she volunteers at the Migrant Desk at San Fernando City La Union three times a week, refers women migrant workers to relevant government units for legal assistance and reintegration support. She also delivers trainings to prospective women migrant workers to help them identify the warning signs and risks of trafficking and illegal recruitment, and how to access legal assistance and support if they are abused.

As of June 2016, 118 women migrant workers have been trained on their rights, and an additional 45 on entrepreneurship management and 49 on organizational development. The pilot programme has developed critically needed capacity of women migrant workers and their groups so that they are able to build upon the gains made so far and continue to advocate for women migrant workers’ rights at the local and national levels.

Credit for all photos: UN Women/Norman Gorecho

[1] UN Women (2016). Filipino Women Migrant Workers Fact Sheet  

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Living and Working Safely: Challenges for Migrant and Seasonal Farmworkers

Thomas a. arcury.

Department of Family and Community Medicine, Center for Worker Health, Program in Community Engagement and Implementation, Wake Forest University Translational Science Institute, Wake Forest School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, North Carolina

Sara A. Quandt

Department of Epidemiology and Prevention, Division of Public Health Services, Program in Community Engagement and Implementation, Wake Forest University Tranlational Science Institute, Wake Forest School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, North Carolina

Migrant and seasonal farmworkers are essential to North Carolina agriculture, yet they experience major health risks. This commentary describes the characteristics of North Carolina farmworkers, important hazards they face, and the status of regulatory protections. Finally, it presents a summary of policy needed to protect the health of farmworkers.

Migrant and seasonal farmworkers are essential to the success of agriculture in North Carolina. These farmworkers provide the hand labor needed to plant, cultivate, and harvest many of the state’s economically important crops, including tobacco, cucumbers, sweet potatoes, berries, peaches, apples, and Christmas trees. Immigrant farmworkers are also increasingly full-time employees, supporting the production of livestock and poultry, as well as crops. Although essential for agriculture’s financial success, farmworkers seldom share in its financial rewards. Rather, they experience significant occupational and environmental exposures, deplorable living conditions, limited safety training, and few supporting regulations [ 1 ].

This commentary reviews the characteristics of the farmworkers who work in North Carolina, important farmworker occupational and environmental health risks and outcomes, living conditions that affect farmworker health, and the status of safety training and regulatory protections. Finally, this commentary presents a summary of policy and regulations needed to protect the health of farmworkers.

Farmworkers in North Carolina

Few data document the number of farmworkers employed in North Carolina or describe the characteristics of these farmworkers. The 2007 Census of Agriculture (available at: http://www.agcensus.usda.gov ) provides some information. In 2007, 12,284 North Carolina farms employed 77,400 workers, with 2413 of these farms employing migrant labor and 9521 farms employing 48,305 employees who worked fewer than 150 days per year. The North Carolina Employment Security Commission estimated that, in 2010, farms in the state employed 35,520 migrant farmworkers, 24,725 seasonal farmworkers, and 8905 farmworkers with H-2A guest worker visas. These numbers are acknowledged to be conservative estimates. In 2009, the Employment Security Commission reported that 35,000 of the 36,000 migrant farmworkers spoke Spanish.

Information describing the personal characteristics of farmworkers employed in North Carolina is limited to small surveys. These show that the overwhelming majority of farmworkers are Latino, and most were born in Mexico. However, farmworkers have diverse backgrounds, and some African American and Afro-Caribbean farmworkers continue to be employed in the state. Recently, some farms have employed workers from Southeast Asia. Migrant farmworkers are largely unaccompanied men, but some farmworker families migrate, and many seasonal workers live with their families. Although most farmworkers are in their 20s and 30s, a sizable number of farmworkers are under 18, and some are as young as 12 and 13. Farmworkers in their 40s, 50s, and 60s are common. Farmworkers are poor, and many have little formal education. Most farmworkers speak Spanish, with approximately one-quarter speaking an indigenous (American Indian) language.

Occupational Exposures and Health Outcomes

Agriculture is a dangerous industry. Occupational and environmental hazards that confront farmworkers in North Carolina include the physical environment (sun, heat, rain, organic and inorganic dust), wild plants (eg, poison ivy) and animals (eg, snakes), sharp tools, equipment, chemicals, and noise.

Official rates for occupational injuries and illnesses are not available for farmworkers in North Carolina. Few farmworkers have access to workers’ compensation. No surveillance system exists for occupational injuries in agriculture. Therefore, farmworker injury and illness data must be gleaned from surveys and clinic reports. Occupational injuries common to farmworkers include cuts and lacerations, eye injuries, musculoskeletal problems, and skin conditions [ 2 ]. Hearing loss and respiratory conditions are common to farmworkers employed in other regions of the country, but little research has been conducted on these effects in North Carolina.

Three hazards are particularly critical for North Carolina farmworkers. Heat stress is common among farmworkers, because of the state’s high temperatures in July and August [ 3 ]. These high temperatures are magnified by the physical exertion of farm labor, which often occurs within the enclosure of tight tobacco rows. Few years pass without a death from heat stress in North Carolina.

Nicotine exposure from working with tobacco plants is another important hazard for North Carolina farmworkers. Farmworkers absorb nicotine while working with tobacco, to the point of acute nicotine poisoning; this is referred to as green tobacco sickness, or GTS [ 4 ]. One-quarter of farmworkers experience GTS each year. Symptoms of GTS include headache, dizziness, nausea, vomiting, insomnia, and anorexia. GTS is a self-limiting occupational illness, because the body will metabolize nicotine within 24 hours. However, GTS can lead to severe dehydration when combined with the heat in which farmworkers labor. Further, farmworkers must work every day or not receive any income, and those who are particularly susceptible to GTS continue to experience symptoms daily.

Biomarker data document that all North Carolina farmworkers show evidence of recent agricultural pesticide exposure [ 5 ]. Luckily, acute pesticide exposure remains rare. However, long-term exposure to small amounts of pesticides has negative health consequences. Data documenting the sequelae of long-term exposure among North Carolina farmworkers are not available, but current research is being conducted to address this issue.

Living Conditions

Farmworkers experience significant exposure to hazards because of their living conditions. Although these hazards are more severe among migrant farmworkers, they also apply to many seasonal farmworkers who live in North Carolina year-round. Travel and transportation is the first of these hazards. The act of crossing the border from Mexico to the United States results in many deaths each year. Many farmworkers do not control the transportation that they use. They must travel in crowded vehicles from region to region, looking for work. They must also travel, on a daily basis, from their residences to work in these vehicles.

Housing is another hazard that farmworkers experience. The housing available to farmworkers, whether in migrant farmworker camps controlled by farmers or contractors or in rural communities, is overwhelmingly substandard. Housing regulations exist for migrant farmworkers but not for seasonal farmworkers. However, enforcement of migrant housing regulations is limited. For example, more than 25% of migrant camps violate regulations for sufficient laundry facility and bedroom space, and 1 in 5 camps has signs of rodent infestation [ 6 ]. Farmworker housing exposes workers and their families to toxicants, including lead and pesticides; to allergens, including mold, mildew, and insect and rodent dander; to electrical and structural hazards; and to crowded conditions.

Although farmworkers toil to produce food, they are often food insecure; almost half of farmworker households studied by Quandt and colleagues [ 7 ] were found to be food insecure. Food insecurity results from low wages and not having access to safety net programs, such as food stamps. Food insecurity is more pronounced among farmworkers who have children living with them.

Many farmworkers, seasonal as well as migrant, are separated from their families. Recent US policy on immigration has exacerbated this problem, as many farmworkers are now staying in the United States year-round, rather than risk trying to cross the border each year. Farmworkers are often isolated, living in rural areas with no transportation. They experience discrimination and harassment. They must often work long hours, with little diversion or entertainment. As a result, farmworkers have high rates of anxiety, depression, and other mental health problems [ 8 ].

Also related to separation from family and isolation, farmworkers are at increased risk for sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV, because of their use of commercial sex workers and because of men having sex with men [ 9 ]. Farmworkers are at increased risk for infectious diseases, such as tuberculosis and hepatitis, because of crowded living conditions.

Finally, when farmworkers get injured or ill, they have limited access to health care [ 10 ]. The migrant clinic network is limited to approximately 24 clinics across the state. Many of these have limited hours of operations. Farmworkers seldom have health insurance.

Training and Regulatory Requirements

Although farmworkers experience extensive occupational and environmental hazards and although they endure extremely poor living conditions, policies to protect the occupational health of farmworkers are limited. Agriculture is exempt from many of the occupational health standards of other industries; these exemptions, referred to as “agricultural exceptionalism,” were meant to protect family farms but continue to shield industrial agriculture [ 11 ].

Current regulations protecting North Carolina farmworkers include those concerning pesticide safety, field sanitation, housing for migrant farmworkers, and minimum wage. The US Environmental Protection Agency’s Worker Protection Standard (WPS) requires that those who might be exposed to pesticides receive specific training, that they be provided with information about the pesticides to which they might be exposed, and that they be provided with medical care if they experience an acute pesticide exposure. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) supports regulations prescribing field sanitation requirements for farmworkers. These regulations indicate where and when drinking water and cups, hand washing facilities, and restrooms are to be provided to farmworkers. The North Carolina Migrant Housing Act (MHA), which is more stringent than the OSHA regulations on which it is based, includes regulations for minimum housing requirements for migrant farmworkers (no such regulations are available for seasonal farmworkers). These housing regulations provide minimum standards for bedding, storage space for personal belongings, showers, toilets, refrigerator space, and laundry facilities. The North Carolina Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Bureau is responsible for ensuring that farmworkers receive at least the minimum hourly rate of pay; farmworkers employed on small farms are exempt from the minimum wage law. Farmworkers with H-2A visas should receive an hourly rate greater than the minimum. However, research in North Carolina and elsewhere shows that farmworkers often are not afforded the protections of the WPS, the OSHA field sanitation requirements, the North Carolina MHA, or the minimum wage rates [ 6 , 12 , 13 ].

North Carolina and the nation must become more realistic about the labor needed to support agriculture, and they must become more humane in treating those who work to plant and harvest our fruits, vegetables, and other agricultural products. Because of the history of agricultural exceptionalism, few health and safety regulations are available to protect agricultural workers.

Immigration policy reform is needed. Although immigrant workers are essential to the financial success of agriculture, it is extremely difficult for agricultural employers and workers to conform to current immigration regulations. The H-2A visa program is one avenue for the legal and safe movement of agricultural workers. In North Carolina, migrant farmworkers with H-2A visas who have been recruited by the North Carolina Growers Association are represented by the Farm Labor Organizing Committee. Although research shows that the occupational safety and living conditions of migrant farmworkers with H-2A visas are better than those of migrant farmworkers without H-2A visas [ 12 , 13 ], investigators also raise serious human rights concerns about the current H-2A visa program [ 14 ].

Regulations are needed that require occupational safety training that is linguistically and educationally appropriate for farmworkers [ 15 ]. However, safety training is no panacea for the technological and organizational changes needed to make agriculture a safer industry. Appropriate safety regulations that address all areas of agriculture work, including child labor, heat stress, pesticide and other chemical exposures, minimum wage and payment for overtime work, workers’ compensation, field sanitation, and housing, are needed. Farmworkers need assurance that they will be protected should they decide to report violations of existing regulations or should they decide to organize. In North Carolina, the Farmworker Advocacy Network ( http://www.ncfan.org/ ) has advocated for new legislation that addresses many of these safety regulations. Funding is needed to support the enforcement of current safety regulations. Neither the North Carolina Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services nor the North Carolina Department of Labor has sufficient staff to enforce the current WPS pesticide safety regulations or the current migrant housing and field sanitation regulations.

Adequate health care for all farmworkers is also needed. Few farmworkers in North Carolina have employer-provided health insurance. Workers’ compensation is available only to farmworkers with H-2A visas or to those working for someone with 10 or more full-time employees. The North Carolina Farmworker Health Program, Office of Rural Health and Community Care ( http://www.ncfhp.org/ ), supports migrant farmworker clinics across the state, as well as other programs. However, the 24 clinic sites supported through this program are insufficient to serve the needs of migrant farmworkers, who labor in most of the state’s 100 counties. Further, seasonal farmworkers often are not eligible for these services.

In 1960, the Edward R. Murrow documentary Harvest of Shame showed the plight of farmworkers in the United States. This documentary increased awareness in America about the human cost of its food. It also led to policy changes that improved some aspects of farmworker lives. Although improvement in farmworker occupational health and safety continues, public policy is needed to address the conditions that farmworkers, farmers, and all agricultural workers must endure.

The North Carolina Gold Star Grower Program

Regina Cullen

Agriculture provides employment and income to more than 20 million people nationwide and to more than 800,000 here in North Carolina. It’s an industry that can exact a powerful cost: farm machinery, agricultural chemicals, grain bins, and farm animals all can place those working in agriculture in a danger zone, both in the working environment as well as in living conditions. During 2007, hired farm labor was reported on 482,186 (22%) of the nation’s farms and ranches. North Carolina, 1 of 9 states that account for just over half of all workers hired directly by farm operators, has made efforts to highlight agricultural danger zones.

The North Carolina legislature enacted the Migrant Housing Act (MHA) of North Carolina, which took effect in 1990. The MHA consolidated the inspection of migrant housing in the North Carolina Department of Labor (NCDOL) and updated housing inspection standards. In addition to enforcing the Occupational Safety and Health Administration migrant housing regulations—the Temporary Labor Camp Standard (29 CFR 1910.142)—the MHA added fire protection, heating, kitchen sanitation, and hot water requirements. Field sanitation provisions were expanded to apply to all individuals providing migrant housing. Housing owners or operators who provide housing to 1 or more migrant worker must register the housing with NCDOL 45 days before the workers take occupancy. Water and septic systems are required to be inspected by the local county health departments.

For many North Carolina growers, this legislation was not an easy pill to swallow. Before the MHA, growers had been subject to other rules, enforced by other agencies, and did not come under inspection unless they housed more than 10 farmworkers. But for advocates, the MHA did not go far enough.

The North Carolina Gold Star Grower program began in the early 1990s as a response to the inspection process. Some growers complained, “Why are you inspecting me? I meet all the requirements! There are folks down the road that NEED your inspection. I don’t! I work hard to keep this house right!” Office staff and inspectors noticed this, as well, commenting, “Some housing is always in great shape. What can we do to acknowledge the growers’ efforts?” Inspectors observed that some growers provided housing that exceeded the MHA requirements: installing telephones or providing appliances such as microwave ovens and freezers.

Such discussions led one staffer to remark, “Remember back in school, when we’d get a gold star on our papers?” The Gold Star Grower program began with simple thank you notes, blue cards with a gold star in the corner, sent to those whose housing met all the requirements of the MHA. In 1992, there were 136 Gold Star Growers (13% of those inspected).

NCDOL held the first recognition luncheon in 1994 and has held them annually ever since. In the beginning, these events took place in various locations throughout the state, including Kernersville, Wilson, Lexington, Farmville, Mount Olive, and Greenville. Hosts included North Carolina State University Cooperative Extension agents: Mark Tucker, in Forsyth County, and Tom Campbell, in Pasquotank County. Commodity groups—cucumber, tobacco, blueberry, Christmas trees—are supporters. Growers who receive 2 consecutive stars are then eligible to conduct their own housing inspections the following year. They must attend the luncheon, continue to register their housing, and have their water and septic systems inspected.

Two-way communication proved beneficial: problems discussed at Gold Star luncheon meetings included farm safety issues. The danger zone expanded from housing issues to the farm field and beyond. In 1998, driving farm equipment on rural roadways was the topic Gold Star Growers considered their “most serious workplace safety problem.” Solutions included grant money from the Governor’s Highway Safety Program to fund educational programs and to provide all registered growers with slow moving vehicle signs for their farm vehicles. Billboards with tractors and the slogan “Slow Moving” were posted in a number of rural counties, drawing attention to the problem. North Carolina State Cooperative Extension worked with NCDOL to promote Light & Reflect, the safety program developed as a result of this initiative. Other agricultural safety initiatives include workplace safety DVDs, in English and Spanish, filmed on Gold Star farms. Safety topics include pesticide information, heat stress/stroke recognition and prevention, and machine guarding. At present, a housing DVD is in production. Topics include fire prevention, bathroom sanitation, electrical issues, and maintenance. The DVDs, distributed to all growers who register their housing, are used to conduct on-site farm training.

Our belief is that all agriculture-related illnesses, injuries, and fatalities are preventable. The Gold Star Grower program addresses the health and safety of the agricultural workforce by viewing it from multiple perspectives: grower, farmworker, and safety professional. The Gold Star list keeps growing; the program has proven to be an effective initiative for the growers and the state. Permitting growers who have earned the right to self-inspect allows the Agricultural Safety and Health Bureau to focus resources on unregistered camps and on growers who need intervention.

Regina Cullen bureau chief, Agricultural Safety and Health Bureau, North Carolina Department of Labor, Raleigh, North Carolina.

Address correspondence to Regina Cullen, NC Department of Labor, 1101 Mail Service Ctr, Raleigh, NC 27699-1101 ( [email protected] ).

Acknowledgments

Financial support. National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (R01-ES008739 and R01-ES012358).

Potential conflicts of interest. T.A.A. and S.A.Q. have no relevant conflicts of interest.

Contributor Information

Thomas A. Arcury, Department of Family and Community Medicine, Center for Worker Health, Program in Community Engagement and Implementation, Wake Forest University Translational Science Institute, Wake Forest School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

Sara A. Quandt, Department of Epidemiology and Prevention, Division of Public Health Services, Program in Community Engagement and Implementation, Wake Forest University Tranlational Science Institute, Wake Forest School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

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The history of Migrant Labour in South Africa

Introduction

The migrant labour system marks a period in which African men were integrated into wage labour. Black men changed  from being farmers in their own lands to being cheap labour in the mines. African men from the Bantustans and from other neighbouring countries left their families behind to work as contract labourers in the mines. The migrant labour system is the evidence of how legislation was used to the benefit of mining magnates and white workers to oppress African workers. African migrant labourers did not only work as cheap labour, but they also worked under harsh conditions as they were also victims of abuse by their white supervisors.

From peasants to migrant labour

The control over African labour began in 1834 after slavery was abolished. The abolition of slavery led to constant labour demands that were influenced by the discovery of diamond and gold in South Africa [1] . It was then only through cheap wage labour that African labourers could still be controlled as slavery was no longer an option. The large part of South African history is centred around the transformation of the majority of the country's people. The rural African population changed from their pre-colonial status as pastoralist-cultivators to their current status as subsistence rural dwellers. The inability to sustain themselves through agriculture made them rely on wages earned in white industrial areas or on white farms for subsistence [2] . The vital post-mineral era was one in which non-market forces prevailed. It was an era in which economic and political power bearers utilised discriminatory and coercive measures to marginalise the African peasantry. The  economy was built with a structure that favoured market forces for the white capitalist sector [3] .

Moreover, the reduction in the productivity and profitability of African agriculture as well as the consequent increase in Africans' reliance on wage labour, is a significant component of the character of capitalist growth in South Africa [4] . African employment in the mines was due to deprivation in tribal areas as a result of soil erosion, population growth and land occupation by whites [5] . Things became more difficult for farmers in 1886 after the discovery of gold as it meant more labour would be needed [6] . Black labour on Witwatersrand mines was short of 100 000 men by the turn of the century [7] . There was competition between the farms and mines about African labour [8] . This meant that mining magnates and farmers had to find ways to attract African labour.

The Integration of Africans into wage labour in the mines

Between 1890 and 1914 there were challenges with labour and capital and as a result during this period Southern African labour was either forced, cheap, resembled bondage or modern slavery [9] . Black men were forced to migrate while in the process their land was dispossessed [10] . It was not only because Africans were forced to work in the mines but also the spreading knowledge about work in the mines played a role in the integration of Africans in the mines. In addition, agents also painted a rosy picture about the advantages of working in the mines for Africans and as a result it was perceived as a privilege to have worked in the mines among African tribes [11] . Workers worked under exploitative conditions as the death rate of workers in 1903 was eighty per thousand and Black workers were frequently assaulted by whites [12] . It was not only South Africans who worked as cheap labour in the mines but also African men from other neighbouring countries such as Mozambique , Swaziland , and Botswana .

Composition of labour

By 1936, South Africans made up 58 percent of the Black labor force. However, when recruitment in the North was reopened in 1973, the number decreased to 22 percent [13] . Mozambicans were mostly preferred, because they lasted in jobs and did not have problems with working underground [14] . In 1961, Tanzania officially ceased with recruitments to South Africa as a form of protest against apartheid government. In 1966, Zambia followed while on the contrary Malawi continued to supply migrant labourers to South Africa and this was because of economic dependence, and it was only in 1974 that Malawi withdrew 120 000 migrant labourers [15] . This withdrawal by Malawi was the first to have major repercussions on demand patterns [16] . The recruitment of foreign migrant labourers was later influenced by the independence of the most powerful states in the region which were a political threat to South Africa. The rise in the price of gold, lengthy recession which was made worse by drought and the changes in internal political and economic policies in South Africa also influenced the recruitment of migrant labourers [17] .

Recruitment organisations

Recruitment organisations were established to further integrate Africans into the migrant labour system in the mines. The Chamber of Mines established The Native Labour Department in 1893 to focus on resources in the former Transvaal. The Department was established to primarily focus on the recruitment of Black labourers from Mozambique [18] . It was later replaced by the Rand Native Labour Association which its role was to supply labour force to mines while also ensuring there was no competition between mines [19] . The Witwatersrand Native Labour Association (WNLA) also referred to as Wenela was later established in 1900 and its initial role was to recruit labourers from Mozambique for different industries, It was later limited to gold mines and also expanded recruitment to other parts of Southern Africa [20] . The other reason for the formation of Wenela was to monopolise recruitment to prevent competition for labour by mines [21] . Although Wenela was to recruit all black labour for the industry, it took time for mines to stop competing for South African labour [22] . A few years after the establishment of Wenela, it became enormously powerful and influential to such an extent that by 1907, it had already recruited 100 082 Black labourers from Transvaal, Bechuanaland, Swaziland, Cape Colony, Mozambique and British central Africa Protectorate. The highest number of labourers which was 47 656 was recruited from Mozambique [23] . Wenela recruitment expanded even more in the 1930s, it expanded to Bechuanaland, Nyasaland, Northern Rhodesia, Angola, and Southwest Africa [24] . Recruitments were accompanied by agreements between South Africa, Nyasaland, and Northern Rhodesia in 1938 although the Inter-Territorial Migrant Labour later replaced it in 1947 [25] .

Legislation

There was a need to organise labour supply in the mining industry and as a result significant legislative and administrative effort was required [26] .The pass laws were first introduced by the Chamber of Mines and these pass laws demanded that African miners wear a badge or a metal plate on the arm [27] . The Glan Grey Act of 1894 was established to enslave Africans through the introduction of tax. Cecil Rhodes, the prime minister of the Cape Colony at the time described the introduction of tax as removing the Native from life of sloth by teaching them the importance of labour and to make them contribute to the prosperity of the state by giving return to good government [28] . This was a way of trapping Black people into the service of white employers [29] . Although such laws were not helpful in increasing labour supply, they were evidence of the power of mining financiers to create law into their own favour.

Involvement of the state

State support was needed by the mines in enforcing legislation and administration because Africans were not willing to accept mine labour and mostly underground work [30] . The reluctance of African labourers to work in the mines was also attributed to their unwillingness to break with their tradition, not wanting to work for foreigners who talked a strange language and having to leave their wives and families behind [31] . Despite the mining owners' wishes, black labour was not available and those who agreed to sign employment contracts were not  reliable workers, as they constantly fled and looked for work on the Rand [32] . Even in the early difficult years of diamond activity which marked the development of the mining sector in South Africa, African labour was in demand to such an extent that wage of African labourers was as high as those paid to white workers overseas [33] . This then made the mines to be dependent on the government. Dependence on the government was also necessary because of the competition between the different mines, the government was used to maintain discipline [34] . In 1900, the mining magnates approached Transvaal government requesting that labour requirements be a state enterprise, but they were turned down [35] . After the Anglo-Boer war, Randlords exercised power through the state as the state became sensitive to their needs [36] . They believed that good governance should come with abundant labour as abundant labour would enable cutting down wages and by 1906 there was an improvement in the flow of African migrant labour in the mines [37] .

The Colour Bar

 The first legal colour bar in the economy was adopted by the Volksraad in 1893 [38] . Workers were imported from Europe and the difference between skilled and unskilled labour began. Skilled men were white people while unskilled men were Black people and white men in the gold mines perceived themselves as aristocracy of labour [39] . A clause in the first mining stipulated that only white people can do the actual blasting although it was later dropped in 1896 [40] . The job of engine drivers was reserved for whites only and the regulations had to be tightened up with the importation of labour from China in 1904 [41] . The importation of labour from China was accepted by whites on a condition that the employment of Chinese was only limited to enumerated list of capacities in order to prevent Chinese from competing with skilled and semi-skilled whites [42] . This was a way of reserving jobs that were meant for white people. During this time, the number of white labourers was larger than usual, and it was not only Chinese who were a threat to white labour as in 1907 whites protested to prevent Black people from doing skilled jobs [43] . Despite the fact that the strike was defeated, it had the consequence of forcing the government to impose a strict rationing of civilized labor to indentured locals in the mining industry [44] . As a result, the challenging periods between the end of the Anglo-Boer war and the Act of Union, white miners in the Witwatersrand were able to maintain their status of privilege [45] .

Through the Mines and Works Act of 1911, the status of white miners was further entrenched as this law allowed the Governor General to establish regulations that required certificate of competency for performance for diverse types of works and these certificates were only issued to whites in the Transvaal and Free State [46] . When in 1897, the Chamber of Mines attempted to reduce the wages of all its employees, white employees went on a strike and their wages were never reduced and Black workers’ own were reduced [47] . After the successful strike of white workers and after their unions gained recognition in 1913, black workers decided to protest  against their working conditions. One of the grievances by black workers was the colour bar as it prevented them from getting promotions and even after the protest, it was never removed [48] . When the Chamber of Mines was under pressure from white trade unions in 1918, they decided to preserve the status quo on the mines with regards to the employment of black people and white people [49] . The reason for this agreement was to prevent the crumbling of the colour bar which would have not been prevented by legislation due to labour shortages [50] .

The chairman of mines, Albu in 1897 noted that it was necessary for the wages of natives to be reduced because they needed to reduce their expenditure as mines and to also prevent the natives from becoming rich in a short period of time [51] . The Chamber of Mines ensured that the wages of the labourers never increased as it would take long for them to return to the mines, so by paying low wages they ensured they returned to the mines within a short period of time [52] . Wage reduction was implemented three times by the mines, in 1890, 1896 and 1897 to ensure profit maximisation [53] . The formation of the Labor Association in 1896 was accompanied by an agreement to cut pay, which was enforced by wage sheet inspections [54] . As a result, by 1899 the Chamber of Mines was successful in raising the black labour force to 99 000 men at the lowest wage rate ever since the establishment of the mining industry [55] . Also, when Wenela was set up, the Chamber of Mines lowered wages from R5 to R3 a month before the Anglo-Boer war [56] .

It can be concluded that the migrant labour system was all about profit maximisation of the mines and this could only be achieved through the exploitation of African labourers. Even when African labourers raised their grievances, their voices were never heard, and it was only white workers who were protected. The colour bar which was reinforced by racism also played a part in the exploitation of African labour as higher positions were only reserved for white workers. Legislation also reinforced the idea that skilled and semi-skilled workers were only white through the certificates of competency that were issued only to white workers.

[1] Seabela, M. 2021. A brief history of labour control in South Africa: Migrant Labour and the Recruitments, 1890s-1970s. Available: A brief History of Black Labour control in South Africa: Migrant Labour and Recruitments, 1890s-1970s – Ditsong Museums of South Africa Accessed [2022, May 28]

[2] Bundy, C., 1972. The emergence and decline of a South African peasantry. African Affairs, 71(285), pp.369-388.

[3] Bundy, C. 1972. p 371

[4] Bundy, C. 1972. p 371

[5] Hutt, W, H. 1964 p 48

[6] Wilson, F., 1972. Labour in the South African gold mines 1911-1969 (Vol. 6). Cambridge University Press. p 2

[7] Wilson, F. 197 p 2

[8] Hutt, W.H., 1964. The economics of the colour bar. Ludwig von Mises Institute. p 51          

[9] Seabela, M. 2021

[10] Seabela, M. 2021

[11] Hutt, W, H. 1964. p 48

[12] Wilson, F. 1972 p 4

[13] Seabela. 2021

[14] Seabela. 2021

[15] Seabela. 2021

[16] De Vletter, F., 1985. Recent trends and prospects of black migration to South Africa. The Journal of Modern African Studies, 23(4), pp.667-702.

[17] De Vletter, F.1985 p 667.

[18] Seabela, M. 2021

[19] Seabela, M. 2021

[20] Seabela, M. 2021

[21] Wilson, F. 1972 p 4

[22] Wilson, F. 1972 p 4

[23] Seabela, M. 2021

[24] Seabela, M. 2021

[25] Seabela, M. 2021

[26] Jeevs, A. 1975 p 3

[27] Seabela, M. 2021

[28] Seabela, M. 2021

[29] Wilson, F. 1972 p 2

[30] Jeeves, A., 1975. The control of migratory labour on the South African gold mines in the era of Kruger and Milner. Journal of Southern African Studies, 2(1), pp.3-29.

[31] Hutt, W, H. 1964 p 51

[32] Levy, N., 1983. The foundation of the South African cheap labour system. Indicator South Africa, 1(1), pp.31-32.

[33] Hutt, W, H. 1964 p 48.

[34] Jeevs, A. 1975 p 4

[35] Wilson, F. 1972 p 4

[36] Levy, N. 1983 p 31

[37] Levy, N. 1983 p 32

[38] Wilson, F. 1972 p 7.

[39] Wilson, F. 1972 p 7

[40] Wilson, F. 1972 p 7

[41] Wilson, F. 1972 p 7

[42] Wilson, F. 1972 p 8

[43] Wilson, F. 1972 p 7

[44] Wilson, F. 1972 p 7

[45] Wilson, F. 1972 p 7

[46] Wilson, F. 1972 p 8

[47] Wilson, F. 1972 p 7

[48] Wilson, F. 1972 p 9

[49] Wilson, F. 1972 p 9

[50] Wilson, F. 1972 p 9

[51] Levy, N. 1983 p 31

[52] Seabela, M. 2021

[53] Levy, N. 1983 p 31

[54] Wilson, F. 1972 p 2

[55] Wilson, F. 1972 p 2

[56] Wilson, F. 1972 p 4

• Bundy, C., 1972. The emergence and decline of a South African peasantry. African Affairs, 71(285), pp.369-388.
• De Vletter, F., 1985. Recent trends and prospects of black migration to South Africa. The Journal of Modern African Studies, 23(4), pp.667-702.
• Hutt, W.H., 1964. The economics of the colour bar. Ludwig von Mises Institute.
• Jeeves, A., 1975. The control of migratory labour on the South African gold mines in the era of Kruger and Milner. Journal of Southern African Studies, 2(1), pp.3-29.
• Levy, N., 1983. The foundation of the South African cheap labour system. Indicator South Africa, 1(1), pp.31-32.
• Seabela, M. 2021. A brief history of labour control in South Africa: Migrant Labour and the Recruitments, 1890s-1970s . Available: A brief History of Black Labour control in South Africa: Migrant Labour and Recruitments, 1890s-1970s – Ditsong Museums of South Africa Accessed [2022, May 28]
• Wilson, F., 1972. Labour in the South African gold mines 1911-1969 (Vol. 6). Cambridge University Press.

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History Resources

Of Mice and Men and Migrant Farm Workers of the Great Depression

By matthew clements.

John Steinbeck’s famous hobos, George and Lennie, bring the migrant farm experience of the Great Depression to life in the celebrated classic of American literature, Of Mice and Men . Part of the huge grain growing industry of the American west, Depression Era itinerant farm workers like George and Lennie, mostly single men, traveled by boxcar from farm to farm in search of work and ever since have populated the landscape of the American cultural milieu. Depictions of these hobos are found in many varieties of art, from paintings, photography, music, and literature. This lesson explores the various representations of depression era migrant farm workers and compares them to migrant farm workers of today.

This lesson should take about three class periods.

• Students will be able to identify and understand the lifestyle of migrant farm workers during the Great Depression.
• Students will be able to understand common characteristics of the hobo experience from various depictions of migrant farm workers in art.
• Students will be able to use primary and secondary sources to explain the migrant worker’s lifestyle.
• Students will be able to compare the lifestyle of depression era migrant farm workers to the lifestyle of today’s migrant farm workers.
• Of Mice and Men , John Steinbeck (any edition)
• "The Hobo’s Lullaby" lyrics, Woody Guthrie , Woody Guthrie Official Site
• " The Hobo’s Lullaby" audio , YouTube.com
• Large sheet of easel paper

After reading Of Mice and Men , explain that migrant farm workers like George and Lennie have been depicted in many varieties of art, and were known by many nicknames like hobos, bindle stiffs, and boxcar Willies. Tell the students we are going to listen to one such depiction in song. Distribute the lyrics to "The Hobo’s Lullaby" by Woody Guthrie and have students listen to the song at least once.

Have students compare the hobo lifestyle depicted in the song to George and Lennie. Write the comparisons on the board, which should include but is not limited to A) drifting from town to town, B) worn clothing, C) not thinking about the future but living month to month, and D) worrying about being in trouble with the law.

Development

Divide students into groups of about four students. Each group will use the Internet to research the lifestyle of migrant farm workers, and will create an aesthetically appealing poster on large sheets of easel paper. Each group’s visual must include the following:

• Three unique facts about the lifestyle of a hobo during the Great Depression
• An interesting quotation from Of Mice and Men that demonstrates the typical migrant worker’s lifestyle
• An image of a hobo found on the Internet (This could be a photo, a painting, a cartoon, etc.)
• Three interesting facts about migrant farm workers in America today

Each group should have access to the Internet, a large sheet of easel paper, markers, tape, and scissors. Each student in the group should be responsible for finding one of the four requirements for the visual.

Culmination

Have each group present its visual to the class. Each student in the group needs to participate in the presentation. During each presentation, ensure that a range of ideas about hobo lifestyle is discussed, as well as several pertinent quotations from Of Mice and Men . Most importantly, have each group compare today’s migrant farm workers to the Great Depression’s hobos and to George and Lennie.

Extension Activities

• Write a compare/contrast essay on migrant farm workers of today, during the Great Depression, and in Of Mice and Men .
• Bring in audio and lyrics to several more "hobo songs" from artists such as Woody Guthrie, Hank Williams, Jimmie Rodgers, and Johnny Cash.
• Analyze other passages of literature depicting hobo or migrant farm worker lifestyle, such as Jack Kerouac’s On the Road and John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath .

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Photo essay: The everyday lives of migrants

Migrant labourers built the cities we live in—but how much do we know about their lives and working conditions.

What has been missing in all this is conversation around their everyday lives, before the crisis. Needless to say, the living and working conditions of these migrant workers and their families are harsh, and exploitation is rampant, especially in the construction sector.

On a visit to Lucknow in the winter of 2019, I had the opportunity to interact with a group of migrant workers at a construction site for a week. There were two groups—one comprising young and old men who were migrants from Bareilly and Gorakhpur, and the other a group of four families from the areas around Panna National Park in Madhya Pradesh.

This photo essay is an attempt to capture their daily life, and a reminder to an apathetic system to include our workers in its imagination and policies to avoid a COVID-19 like exodus again.

The first group of construction workers had migrated to Lucknow from Bareilly and Gorakhpur, in search of employment.

Work on the site involved a range of activities. Here they are seen on-site, casting the roof of the building under construction.

These workers weren’t provided any safety equipment such as shoes, gloves, or helmets. In fact, despite it being peak winter, they did not have warm clothes.

The men live on site in make-shift arrangements, most often working between 12-16 hours a day, sometimes even till midnight. The lack of proper accommodation on-site means that the contractors can call upon them to work at all times, and for long hours, to ensure completion of projects.

As night falls, they take a break to prepare dinner.

In the case of the families comprising women and children, entire lives were lived within the premises of the construction site.

Women do most of the digging, lifting and transporting material kind of work, including carrying cement for brick laying.

Married women working at the sites are expected to cover their heads in the presence of their fathers-in-law. This affects their vision, especially at night, making them vulnerable to injuries and accidents.

Apart from working on the construction site, the responsibility of taking care of the families also falls upon women. They are the first to wake up at four in the morning to cook and complete the other chores.

There is no creche for the children in these families. They play in and around the worksite and are extremely vulnerable to accidents.

Sharmili is 12 years old and has never been to school. When her mother is working, she takes care of her younger siblings. She also teaches them alphabets and numbers, which are the only things she knows. Occasionally, site supervisors teach all the children in the evenings.

The next day, a brick fell on Sharmili from the first floor of the under-construction building and broke her head.

The cities built on the hard labour of migrant workers have so far failed to meet even their basic needs. The current pandemic serves as an important reminder to address the exclusion and discrimination of these migrants and work towards removing their cloak of invisibility.

• Learn more about labour and migration in India, and explore the Interstate Migrant Policy Index 2019 .
• Read about how the COVID-19 pandemic has exposed India’s apathy towards migrant workers.
• Read these personal accounts of migrant workers who could not make it back home during the lockdown.
• Support nonprofits and other organisations providing monetary support, food, medicines, and more to vulnerable communities, including migrants.

The lockdown brought forth images of the travails of migrant workers as they sought to go home during the pandemic. It also highlighted the tremendous contribution they make to our […]

Dheeraj is a documentary filmmaker currently working with the vocational skilling arm of Pratham, on media and research projects. His key area of interest lies in the study of visual mediums such as film and imagery. He has previously worked on various documentary films under the ambit of education, art and livelihoods. You can reach Dheeraj at [email protected]

Home — Essay Samples — Social Issues — Human Migration — The Life of Migrant Workers during The Great Depression

The Life of Migrant Workers During The Great Depression

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Published: Mar 1, 2019

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Eric Adams Called Migrants ‘Excellent Swimmers.’ He Explains Why.

Mayor Adams said that his comment, which drew criticism from the right and the left, was based on numerous conversations he has had with migrants.

By Emma G. Fitzsimmons and Jeffery C. Mays

When Mayor Eric Adams was asked about New York City’s lifeguard shortage at his weekly news conference, he seized the moment to make a point about potential migrant workers.

Imagine if the city could quickly hire migrants for jobs that urgently needed to be filled, he wondered aloud, before asking: “How do we have a large body of people that are in our city and country that are excellent swimmers, and at the same time we need lifeguards?”

His remarks on Tuesday drew criticism from all sides. Immigrant rights groups called the comments “racist and divisive.” Conservative leaders viewed them as an attempt to legitimize the hiring of noncitizens.

Mr. Adams, unsurprisingly, saw things differently.

On Wednesday, the mayor explained that he had visited migrant centers in the city and asked people there if they knew how to swim. He was “blown away” by the number of those who raised their hands.

“We have these capable people who know how to swim — from West Africa, from Ecuador, from South and Central America, from Mexico — and we have a shortage of lifeguards,” Mr. Adams said in response to a question from a reporter from the news outlet The City as he walked into City Hall. “If we start planning out now, we could be prepared next year.”

As nearly 200,000 migrants have arrived in New York City over the last two years, Mr. Adams, a Democrat, has repeatedly called for them to be able to work so they can support themselves. In his remarks on Tuesday, he also suggested that migrants fill key jobs such as food service workers and nurses.

“This hasn’t been new — I’ve been saying this over and over again: Let people work,” Mr. Adams said on Wednesday.

Mr. Adams has previously mentioned hiring migrants as lifeguards, including in February when he was asked about using police drones to help people who are drowning. (A city official noted on Tuesday that New York had made progress in hiring more lifeguards and that 560 people had passed the city’s lifeguard test this year, compared with 364 last year.)

Kayla Mamelak, a spokeswoman for the mayor, said on Wednesday that Mr. Adams had repeatedly argued that migrants who are living in the city’s shelter system should be able to fill vacant jobs and that “anyone who is trying to make more out of the mayor continuing to make that point today is missing the forest for the trees.”

Still, Murad Awawdeh, president of the New York Immigration Coalition, rejected Mr. Adams’s implication that migrants would make good lifeguards “because some immigrants had to swim or wade across water on their dangerous journeys to seek safety in the United States.”

“This comment is racist, and the mayor should not be making light of the perilous and often life-threatening journeys people are forced to make to escape violence and persecution,” he said.

It was not the first time immigrant groups have criticized Mr. Adams’s rhetoric. They have argued that his comments that the migrant crisis could “destroy” New York City and that some migrants were creating a crime wave are dangerous.

Alexa Avilés, a councilwoman representing Brooklyn and the chairwoman of the Committee on Immigration, called the mayor’s comments “appalling.”

“What won’t he blame immigrants for?” she said. “First it was budget cuts and now it’s lifeguard shortages.”

Melissa Mark-Viverito, a former City Council speaker, called the mayor’s comments “insane” on social media .

“ He is just constantly putting out these comments that are very stereotypical, very prejudicial, very just ugly,” she said, adding, “There’s no reflection, there’s no acknowledgment that what I said actually may be hurtful to folks.”

Conservative voices have also criticized Mr. Adams’s response to the migrants, arguing that he has been too accommodating by offering them housing and services, including debit cards for food.

Senator Marsha Blackburn, a Republican from Tennessee, posted a video of the mayor’s comments on social media on Wednesday and asked whether Mr. Adams and other Democrats such as President Biden thought that breaking the law by entering the country was “qualification for employment in our country?”

Mr. Adams has been prone to making off-the-cuff remarks perceived by some as odd, inflammatory or, at times, seemingly untrue — with some examples chronicled in a video on “The Daily Show” this week . He has compared himself to the spiritual leader Gandhi, urged gentrifiers to “go back to Iowa” and joked that he understood angry New Yorkers because he sometimes gave himself the middle finger.

But Marvin Carbajal, a New York City physical education teacher and the head coach for the boys’ swimming team at Bushwick Campus, said there was a germ of truth behind the mayor’s comment. He said he knew of at least seven students on the swim team who could have become city lifeguards, were they not undocumented.

Two of those students, he said, passed the lifeguard test, only to discover that their immigration status precluded them from working.

“It did sound a little bit offensive,” Mr. Carbajal said of the mayor’s remarks, adding, “I kind of understand what he was trying to say.”

Dana Rubinstein contributed reporting.

Emma G. Fitzsimmons is the City Hall Bureau Chief for The Times, covering Mayor Eric Adams and his administration. More about Emma G. Fitzsimmons

Jeffery C. Mays is a Times reporter covering politics with a focus on New York City Hall. More about Jeffery C. Mays

Our Coverage of the Adams Administration

Adams vs. Adams :   A power struggle between Mayor Eric Adams and the City Council speaker, Adrienne Adams, is turning ugly during a time of acute vulnerability for the mayor .

Corruption Investigation :   An aide to Adams who served as his longtime liaison to the Turkish community is cooperating with the federal investigation  into the mayor and his 2021 campaign.

Democrats Take Aim :   Since Adams took office, many of his fellow Democrats have kept their criticism of him muted or private. That period of harmony is over .

Free Preschool :   The mayor promised free prekindergarten for 3-year-olds. But when the Education Department released offers, hundreds of New York City families were left without a place after all .

Affordable Housing :   New York City’s housing crisis is getting worse, but a new analysis found that the Adams administration’s executive budget is expected to result in fewer than usual affordable homes .

With Europe’s support, North African nations push migrants to the desert

“There is Algeria, follow the light,” the Tunisian official barked at the Black migrants. “If you’re seen here, you’ll be shot.”

François, a 38-year-old Cameroonian, obeyed, jumping off the bed of a pickup truck near the desolate Algerian frontier. A day earlier, the rickety boat attempting to carry him and other hopeful sub-Saharan Africans to Europe — including his wife and 6-year-old stepson — had been interdicted by the Tunisian coast guard in the cobalt blue waters off the coast. Still wet and cold, the group of 30 migrants, including two pregnant women, now walked toward their punishment: the desert.

Their ordeal — an odyssey of at least 345 miles from sea to sand, recounted by François and verified by matching GPS tracking on his phone with images and videos he captured during nine days of wandering — illustrates one example of the draconian practices being deployed in at least three North African nations to dissuade sub-Saharan migrants from risky crossings to Europe.

The clandestine operations mainly targeting Black migrants had a silent partner: Europe.

A year-long joint investigation by The Washington Post, Lighthouse Reports and a consortium of international media outlets shows how the European Union and individual European nations are supporting and financing aggressive operations by governments in North Africa to detain tens of thousands of migrants each year and dump them in remote areas, often barren deserts.

• European funds have been used to train personnel and buy equipment for units implicated in desert dumps and human rights abuses, records and interviews show. Migrants have been pushed back into the most inhospitable parts of North Africa, exposing them to abandonment with no food or water, kidnapping, extortion, sale as human chattel, torture, sexual violence and, in the worst instances, death.
• Spanish security forces in Mauritania photographed and reviewed lists of migrants before they were driven to Mali against their will and left to wander for days in an area where violent Islamist groups operate, according to testimony and documents.
• In Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia, vehicles of the same make and model as those provided by European countries to local security forces rounded up Black migrants from streets or transported them from detention centers to remote regions, according to filmed footage, verified images, migrant testimony and interviews with officials.
• European officials held internal discussions on some of the abusive practices since at least 2019, and were flagged to allegations in reports by the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and Frontex, the E.U. border agency.

About this project

The E.U. provided more than 400 million euros to Tunisia, Morocco and Mauritania between 2015 and 2021 under its largest migration fund, the E.U. Emergency Trust Fund for Africa, an initiative to foster local economic growth and stem migration. In addition, the E.U. has funded dozens of other projects that are difficult to quantify and track due to a lack of transparency in the E.U.’s funding system.

To confront a surge of irregular migration last year, Europe moved to deepen its partnerships in North Africa, offering an extra 105 million euros to Tunisia last year and signing a deal in February with Mauritania to provide an additional 210 million euros.

The investigation — focused on Tunisia, Morocco and Mauritania, three countries with some of the deepest E.U. partnerships — amounts to the most comprehensive attempt yet to document European knowledge of and involvement with anti-migrant operations in North Africa. It is based on firsthand observations by journalists, analysis of visual evidence, geospatial mapping, internal E.U. documents, and interviews with 50 migrants who were victims of dumps, as well as European and North African officials, and other people familiar with the operations. Like François, many of the migrants agreed to speak on the condition that only their first names be used, out of fear of retribution.

In Tunisia, visual evidence and testimony were used to verify 11 dumps — of as many as 90 migrants each — in the desert near the borders with Libya and Algeria, one as recent as this month, as well as one instance in which migrants were handed over at the Libyan border and detained. At least 29 people were reported to have died, with dozens missing after being dumped or expelled from Tunisia on the Libyan border, according to the U.N. Support Mission in Libya and humanitarian organizations.

The E.U., under its own laws as well as international treaties, is obliged to ensure that its funds are spent in ways that respect fundamental human rights. But the European Commission, the bloc’s executive branch, has conceded that human rights assessments are not conducted when funding migrant management projects abroad. Agencies that receive E.U. funds are expected to monitor implementation in partnership with external consultants. But accountability for how equipment and funding are used is often opaque, and senior European officials privately concede that it is “impossible” to regulate all uses.

In comments to European lawmakers in January, Ylva Johansson, the E.U. minister in charge of migration, acknowledged reports of desert dumps in at least one country — Tunisia — and conceded that “I can’t say that this practice has stopped.” But she categorically denied that the bloc was “sponsoring” the mistreatment or deportation of migrants through financial support.

A spokesperson for the European Commission said in a statement that migrant management aid to North African countries is designed to combat human trafficking and “defend the rights” of migrants. The bloc, the statement said, seeks to monitor programs through “spot verification missions,” “monitoring exercises” and external evaluations.

Senior officials in Tunisia, Morocco and Mauritania denied racial profiling and the dumping of migrants in remote areas. They insisted that migrant rights were being respected, though officials in Tunisia and Mauritania have said that some migrants have been returned or deported over their arid borders.

“The fact is European states do not want to be the ones to have dirty hands. They do not want to be considered responsible for the violation of human rights,” said Marie-Laure Basilien-Gainche, a human rights and legal expert at France’s Jean Moulin Lyon 3 university. “So they are subcontracting these violations to third states. But I think, really, according to international law, they are responsible.”

Critics note that the operations are also being carried out against the backdrop of a growing backlash across Europe against irregular migration, an issue that is dominating political debates ahead of key June elections for the European Parliament in which the far right is poised to make record gains.

Analysts and former officials say the objective of the operations in North Africa is clear: deterrence.

“You have to make life difficult for” migrants, said a contractor who worked on projects financed by the E.U. Emergency Trust Fund for Africa. The person spoke on the condition that his name be withheld so as not to jeopardize future contracts. “Complicate their lives. So, if a migrant from Guinea is in [Morocco], and you take him to the Sahara two times, the third time he … asks for a voluntary return home.”

The investigation established through witness testimony, videos taken by reporters and footage verified by The Post that anti-migrant operations often involve raids or random street roundups based on racial profiling — the use of which has been acknowledged in E.U. documents. One internal report on Morocco from Frontex, obtained through a freedom of information request, noted “allegations of racial profiling and excessive use of force by the police and other law enforcement officials against migrants, asylum-seekers, and refugees, as well as arbitrary arrests, detentions, and forced relocation from the north to the south, which disproportionately affected migrants from sub-Saharan countries.”

In the Moroccan capital of Rabat, journalists observed three instances over three days in which auxiliary forces that receive E.U. funding rounded up Black migrants in vans. Dozens of videos of similar operations by the same forces were verified as having taken place in Fes, Tangier and Tan-Tan, as well as Laayoune in Moroccan-controlled Western Sahara.

“When they see a Black guy, they come,” said Lamine, a 25-year-old from Guinea who, since early 2023, said he has been repeatedly detained and beaten in Rabat, then dumped in the interior by Moroccan forces despite having refugee papers from UNHCR.

In a statement, Morocco’s Interior Ministry described allegations of racial profiling in migrant removals as “baseless” and said migrants were only relocated to protect them from “trafficking networks” and for “increased protection.” It said European “technical support” for migrant management was “minimal compared to the efforts and costs incurred by our country.”

Wandering in the desert

The Sahara has become an increasingly frequent and perilous punishment for migrants daring to cross the sea to Europe.

François, the 38-year-old from Cameroon, had set off four times in overcrowded boats from the Tunisian coast in the hopes of reaching Europe. All four times, he was picked up at sea and returned to land.

Three times, his detention by authorities led to dumps with other migrants at the desolate Algerian border, he said in interviews describing his experiences. His longest ordeal was in September.

François departed from near the Tunisian city of Sfax in the early hours of Sept. 19 in a crowded boat under the cover of darkness. As the sun rose, and less than 20 miles from shore, they were intercepted by a small patrol vessel of the Tunisian National Guard.

A larger national guard boat arrived to take them to shore. François identified this vessel as identical to one in a photo provided by a reporter of those supplied to Tunisia by the Italian government.

At port, he said, the migrants were beaten with sticks. About 300 of them were loaded onto buses by armed guards and driven hours inland.

At a border guard post near Dar ’Abd al ’Aziz, François, along with his wife and his young stepson, were separated from the rest and put with nearly 30 other exhausted migrants.

Piled into pickup trucks, they were dumped in an arid canyon just over 10 miles from the Algerian border at 4 a.m.

Tunisian guards demanded they cross the border, but as they approached, Algerian forces fired warning shots. So they turned back toward Tunisia.

“It was cold. We were soaked; all our clothes were wet,” François said. “No one had a sweater or a coat. We were looking for two things: to find food, and follow the first rays of the sun to warm up.”

Detained again by Tunisian authorities a few hours later, they were driven further north to be dumped once more.

François’s GPS tracking ended by a building one mile from the Algerian border. He said the national guard searched them and told them to cross the border.

“The place was barren, no sand, a succession of small mountain chains. … Tunisia was behind me, Algeria before me.”

“We had better knowledge of Tunisia, so it was better for us to return to Tunisia.”

They waited two hours, then started to walk.

The group, including two pregnant women, wandered for nine more days.

In remote border towns, François said they begged for bread and water, sometimes receiving it. After being violently assaulted in one village, he said, they went off-road.

“In the middle of the desert, you look left and right. There’s nothing,” François said. Some began to hallucinate until they navigated to the town of Tajerouine.

Witness accounts and visuals reviewed by The Post place the Tunisian National Guard at the center of desert dump operations. Between 2015 and 2023, the German federal police deployed 449 staff members and spent more than 1 million euros to train nearly 4,000 Tunisian national guards. As the dumps were ongoing in November 2023, a 9 million euro border-management training center opened in Tunisia, funded by Austria, Denmark and the Netherlands.

François’s

coordinates

Mediterranean

likely journey

Source: Satellite © Google Earth

François’s likely

journey by foot,

François’s coordinates

tracked by phone GPS

by foot, based

on geolocated

“I think that Tunisia isn’t responsible for what’s happening,” François said. “The E.U. doesn’t like us. Why is the sub-Saharan man seen as garbage?”

‘Abusive collective expulsions’

Last year, the E.U. recorded 380,227 irregular border arrivals , the third increase in three years and the highest number since the region’s Syrian-led refugee crisis of 2015 to 2016. The political fallout has Europe scrambling to turn North Africa into a cordon to curb illegal entries.

In Tunisia, President Kais Saied recently acknowledged “ongoing coordination” of migration returns with “neighboring countries,” and said Tunisian military forces were intervening to stop irregular migration. “Tunisia will not be a place for them, and Tunisia is working not to be a crossing point for them,” he told his national security council earlier this month.

Migrants’ nationalities range widely depending on their access points into Europe, with the largest route — across the central Mediterranean to Italy — dominated last year by Guineans, Tunisians and Ivorians.

In Tunisia, where Saied has floated a “great replacement theory” that sub-Saharan Africans are trying to supplant Arabs in his country and where Black migrants have been targeted for arrest , more-aggressive tactics have led to ebbing numbers on the central Mediterranean route. That route saw a 59 percent plunge in first-quarter arrivals this year, along with a changing demographic: So far in 2024, no sub-Saharan countries figure in the top nationalities traversing it.

In a statement, the Tunisian Foreign Ministry insisted that it upholds migrants’ rights, only expels them “voluntarily” and only then to countries of origin. The ministry dismissed all allegations in this report made by migrants against its security forces as inflammatory.

The ministry heralded 2,718 operations during the first four months of this year that it said had “saved” and “prevented” 21,545 migrants from crossing the sea to Europe and stopped another 21,462 from “infiltrating Tunisian territory” by land.

European officials have hailed those outcomes.

“This cooperation brings many results. I am thinking, for example, of migration management,” Italy’s hard-right Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said during an April visit to Tunis, where she praised Saied’s efforts.

In Mauritania, Spanish officials have enabled aggressive tactics, providing vehicles for migrant transport, aiding in sea interceptions, embedding with raids on migrants and human smugglers, and funding new detention centers, according to tenders, interviews with Mauritanian officials and Spanish promotional videos.

Spanish authorities also appear to be complicit in desert dumps.

In January, Idiatou, 23, and Bella, 27, two friends from Guinea, were taken to the Ksar migrant detention center — a cluster of heavily guarded and walled buildings — in the Mauritanian capital of Nouakchott after a failed attempt to cross by sea to Spain. The center has become a transit point used by Mauritanian officials before they move migrants to the distant border with war-torn Mali, often without food or water, according to interviews with detainees and aid workers.

A person familiar with Idiatou’s and Bella’s incarceration said that two officials from the Spanish police photographed the women during their detention. According to the person, who spoke on the condition of anonymity out of fear of retribution, the officers additionally reviewed a list of prisoners — obtained by the consortium of media outlets — who were later deported to Mali. As with other migrants interviewed for this article, both women said they were denied due process.

In an interview, the women recalled seeing “White” officers who Mauritanian officials told them were Spanish police before being loaded onto a deportation bus. Reporters on the ground observed that bus, a white Toyota Coaster with tinted windows, as it departed Ksar, and followed it for 10 miles along the N3 highway, a road that leads toward Mali.

Ksar Detention

Ksar Detention Center

Many vehicles used by Mauritanian authorities to detain and deport migrants were bought with Spanish funds, according to a senior European official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive issue. Reporters on the ground filmed Toyota pickup trucks going in and out of detention facilities that were of the same make and model as those tendered by the Spanish development agency FIIAPP and the Spanish Interior Ministry. These include Toyota Hilux pickups supplied by Spain in 2019 with the stated purpose of being used by Mauritanian authorities to combat “illegal migration,” according to tenders.

A report from European Parliament members visiting Mauritania in December described a Spanish coast guard team present at the scene as migrants were returned to shore after attempting a sea crossing. Notes from the report stated that after the migrants were screened, most were “swiftly conducted to the border.” Gilles Lebreton, a member of the European Parliament from the French far right who was on that mission, confirmed that officials had been told about deportations to the borders with Mali and Senegal.

A leaked UNHCR document from 2023 also stated that the agency had interviewed more than 300 people deported from Mauritania to Gogui, Mali. A European Parliament document on negotiations between the E.U. border agency and Mauritania said asylum seekers and migrants in Mauritania faced “abusive collective expulsions to Senegal and Mali” and deportation without due process.

In response to a detailed request for comment, Spain’s Interior Ministry did not confirm or deny knowledge of desert dumps, the use of vehicles purchased with Spanish funds in those operations, or that its officers were in a detention center documenting migrants to be involuntarily deported.

The ministry acknowledged that Spain has deployed a force of about 50 police and civil guard officers in Mauritania to “investigate and dismantle human trafficking mafias.” Those forces, the ministry said, were operating with “full respect” for the “human rights and freedoms” of migrants.

The Spanish development agency FIIAPP denied awareness of dumps, and said Spanish police officers working with its programs in Mauritania “had never witnessed any actions by the Mauritanian police that violate human rights.” Those officers, the agency said, also denied having photographed “any migrants in any center.” It declined to confirm whether vehicles filmed by the consortium in anti-migrant operations were provided by the agency, citing security concerns.

Asked about the Spanish police officers in the detention center, Nani Ould Chrougha, Mauritania’s government spokesman, said in a written statement that a bilateral agreement with Madrid “provides for a number of mutual commitments, including the exchange of information in the fight against illegal immigration while respecting the privacy of individuals and the protection of their personal data.”

He said that migrants who attempt to cross the sea to Europe were subject to deportation, but rejected claims that migrants in Mauritania suffered any mistreatment. Those deported to neighboring countries, he said, were being handed over to “competent authorities” at “official border posts.” He stated that migrants were only being repatriated to their countries of origin.

The two women from Guinea, however, said Mauritanian forces left their group in a desolate, unpopulated part of the frontier with Mali, then “chased” them toward the border “like animals.” They walked in a monochromatic landscape for four days until they reached a Malian village where they eventually arranged a ride on to a relative in Senegal.

The tactic seemed to have its desired effect.

“Had I known all this was going to happen, I would not have tried” to go to Europe, Bella said. “I swear I would not. Because we suffered a lot. … We have nothing.”

Ransom demands

Some detained migrants suffer even worse fates.

Moussa, a 39-year-old migrant from Cameroon, recalled cowering in the desert sand with other Black men on the Libyan frontier in November. Rounded up on the streets of Tunisia’s Sfax hours earlier, the sub-Saharan migrants had been forced into white Nissan trucks emblazoned with the emblem of the national police. At an off-road border guard post, Moussa said he watched as Libyan militiamen handed a briefcase to one of the Tunisian officials.

He guessed at what his new Libyan captors would later confirm: The migrants were being sold.

Moussa’s cousin, a 20-year-old from Cameroon detained with him, confirmed his account. The investigation also reviewed testimony with similar allegations that other migrants provided to Doctors Without Borders and to Refugees in Libya.

In Tunisia, security forces are in possession of at least 143 Nissan Navara pickup trucks provided by Italy and Germany between 2017 and 2023 to “fight human traffickers” or “combat irregular immigration and organized crime,” according to tenders and posts on the embassy Facebook accounts of those countries. Moussa and his cousin said they were forced, along with other migrants, into a vehicle of identical make and model. The Post has verified multiple videos showing the same Nissan vehicles involved in other detentions of migrants in Sfax.

Italy’s Foreign Ministry and prime minister’s office both declined to comment; its Interior Ministry did not respond to a request for comment. Germany’s Interior Ministry, in a statement, acknowledged awareness of limited transfers of “refugees and migrants to the Libyan-Tunisian and Algerian-Tunisian border region in the summer of 2023,” and said that Berlin has “repeatedly made clear to Tunisian partners” that the human rights of migrants “must be respected,” calling the issue “a regular topic of discussion.”

Moussa said that, after his sale to plainclothes militiamen carrying AR-style rifles, he was taken to a small, dirt-floor prison in the Libyan outpost of Al Assah, about 35 miles south of the coastal border crossing at Ra’s Ajdir. There, roughly 500 migrants were packed together under a corrugated roof. Intermediaries told him to provide a phone number for his family in Cameroon, from whom a ransom was demanded. One guard bragged that Moussa and other migrants had been bought for the sum of 20 Tunisian dinars each, a little over $6.

The only toilet in the migrants’ holding pen was a hole in one corner. They were fed once a day, scrumming for noodles served on communal pans. Moussa and other migrants were repeatedly beaten, he said. Speaking via video from a Libyan city, he showed scars on his feet that he said were from machete hacks by guards.

To keep the migrants in line, his captors would sometimes randomly fire their weapons. Moussa said he witnessed three migrants die of wounds caused by stray bullets. He was released after his mother — who in a telephone interview from Cameroon confirmed Moussa’s account — spent two months raising the equivalent of $1,000 to pay for his freedom. Unable to bathe during confinement, he said he emerged ridden with scabies and lice. He was dropped off in a coastal Libyan city where he is now working odd jobs for various employers, some of whom, he said, brandish guns after his work is done and then refuse to pay his wages.

“What they’re doing to us is still the system of slavery,” said Moussa, who said he lacks the means to leave Libya. “They have no respect for human beings, no respect for the African man.”

Beatriz Ramalho da Silva, Eman El-Sherbiny, Monica C. Camacho, Tomas Statius, José Bautista, Andrei Popoviciu, Nissim Gasteli, Virgile Demoustier, Jarrett Ley, Junne Alcantara, Laris Karklis and Sarah Hashemi contributed to this report.

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‘the story of souleymane’ review: a tough and tender look at a migrant worker trying to survive in the city of lights.

French director Boris Lojkine's third feature follows an African immigrant navigating Paris' labyrinthine streets as he struggles to make a living and get legalized.  

By Jordan Mintzer

Jordan Mintzer

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Ever since they were granted essential worker status during the pandemic, food deliverers on bikes have become a steady fixture of the contemporary urban landscape. And yet, most us only interact with them for a few seconds at a time, grabbing the box of pizza or bag of food, saying thank you (if we’re polite enough) and quickly shutting the door.

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Another movie immediately comes to mind here, which is Vittorio De Sica’s neorealist classic, Bicycle Thieves . Both films are structured as suspenseful, ticking-clock dramas where men navigate a ruthless city as they ride around on two wheels, doing everything they can to get by.  

In many ways, Lojkine’s third feature plays like an update of the postwar Italian masterpiece, showing how the same story could still happen today — at a time when immigrants occupy some of the toughest working-class jobs in cities around the world, and when such jobs are now at the very bottom of a dog-eat-dog gig economy ruled by indifferent apps.

The film’s eponymous hero, played with fragility and increasing emotional tension by non-actor Abou Sangare, labors for one such unnamed app (think Uber Eats or Deliveroo), racing around Paris’ rain-soaked streets with an isothermal bag to keep the food warm. Souleymane is a hard worker and clearly an honest one, even if he his legal situation forces him to “rent” his driver identity from a fellow African who has papers.

That could all change if he manages to pass an interview with an immigration officer in charge of determining whether he deserves a coveted carte de séjour , which would allow him to live and work legally in France. The “story” of the film’s title refers to the story Souleymane is planning to tell the officer — a story he rehearses with a shady advisor (Alpha Oumar Sow) who claims to know how to manipulate the French system.

Many things we take for granted, such as a regular salary, a bed to sleep in, or a family or friends one can depend on, are absent from Souleymane’s hardscrabble and lonely existence, even if he does occasionally get some help from his fellow migrants. What’s certain is that the Parisians he delivers to, and passes by on his bike, barely see him. (Author’s note: Several scenes in the movie were shot around my own neighborhood.)

One of the film’s most moving sequences involves a brief encounter between Souleymane and an old French man who lives alone in a top-floor apartment, and who becomes the only customer in the entire movie to ask the deliverer where he’s from. Whether the man does so because he’s actually curious about Souleymane, or because he may be senile, is yet another sad truth in this brutally honest depiction of a migrant’s life.

This doesn’t, however, mean that the film feels overtly bleak, and like Lojkine’s debut feature, Hope (which played in Cannes ’ Critics’ Week), The Story of Souleymane is peppered with moments of tenderness and camaraderie, especially among migrants willing to help each other out. One quick and telling scene, in which a kebab vendor gives Souleymane a free coffee, is enough to convince us that humanity is not completely lost.

The race-against-the-clock element of the latter is present here as well, leading to a riveting finale in which Souleymane finally shows up at the interview that will determine his future. By that point, he’s already been through hell, and as he sits down in front of the immigration officer (Nina Meurisse), we’re rooting for him to make it. And yet, after a long back-and-forth that finds Souleymane gradually and painfully baring his soul, including all he went through to get from Guinea to Paris in the first place, Lojkine leaves us wondering what making it even means if you lose so much of yourself in the process.

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