CSO data shows Central Asian migrants face exploitation in their search for work
New research identifies poverty as the main driver of risky migration in Central Asia, a UN report focuses on technology in connection with contemporary forms of slavery, and a news article highlights the exploitation behind the AI revolution.
Freedom Collaborative and Winrock International have published a report on risky migration journeys in Central Asia to fill a critical data gap on the global victim journey map and support anti-trafficking CSOs in the region. The analysis not only provides an overview of the origin locations, transit points and destinations of migrants in the area, but also gives insights into migration drivers, vulnerability factors, and the modi operandi used to facilitate their journeys. Information on exploitation, abuse, and missing migrant cases is also included.
This is our first data collection report to involve CSOs from Central Asia, where information on human trafficking and risky migration routes is scarce. It is part of the Safe Migration in Central Asia Project (SMICA), a five-year program funded by USAID and implemented by Winrock International, which aims to increase the capacity of all stakeholders so they are more self-reliant in their efforts to prevent human trafficking and forced labour, protect victims, and promote safe migration. SMICA is being implemented in four Central Asian countries: Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.
The research was supported by eight local CSOs, whose commitment and participation in the initiative highlights a willingness to work across organizations and countries for a common goal. Together, they have made great steps forward in increasing access to ground truth that can inform operational, tactical, and strategic decisions by relevant actors to strengthen the protection of vulnerable migrants across the region and beyond. Even though the dataset cannot show a complete picture, the available information highlights potential trends and patterns, and increases shared knowledge on these complex issues.
The collected data reveals high migration activity across borders throughout and beyond the region. For both male and female migrants, poverty and unemployment are the main reasons to leave home, and the hope of better economic prospects is a major pull factor. Combined with other, often structural, factors that prevent people from earning money in their home provinces, this desperation makes them susceptible to fraudulent job offers and false promises. Low levels of education have also been identified as a vulnerability factor, followed by addiction, homelessness and abuse – with addiction particularly affecting females and low education levels affecting males.
According to the information submitted, most migrants were recruited through friends or at social events, and traffickers were usually known to their victims. Journeys were facilitated by one or more trafficker and, on reaching destination locations, migrants worked in a range of industries, with a significant proportion of males in the construction industry and the highest proportion of females working in the commercial sex trade. Psychological abuse and withholding of identity documents were the most common forms of exploitation.
CSOs in the region face a myriad of challenges in the course of their work, including a general lack of access to relevant information and data that could support them in meeting the needs of the communities they serve, and allow them to be more effective actors for change. There are few mechanisms they can use to share and analyze the information they gather in a way that could allow for strategic decision-making and the strengthening of advocacy efforts.
We now hope this report will encourage further data collection and lead to: a better understanding of push and pull factors, recruitment strategies, employment abuse, and trafficking indicators; the promotion of a gender and social inclusion approach in programming; consideration of the significance of poverty and unemployment in prevention and protection strategies; awareness training that breaks the initial link between recruiter and victim; greater knowledge among local CSOs of at-risk communities, destination hotspots and critical transit points; and further collaboration between CSOs and community-based organizations along identified routes.
Here’s a round-up of other noteworthy news and initiatives:
In his latest report, the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, including its causes and consequences, focuses on the use of technology in facilitating and preventing contemporary forms of slavery. Following an overview of digital technologies which enable sexual or labour exploitation, the report, which contains inputs from Freedom Collaborative and other CSOs, focuses on which digital tools can help to prevent or address these practices and which challenges remain.
And, as the progress of AI becomes the latest story in digital news, this article highlights that the technology behind it, often thought of as a human-free learning machine, actually relies on the labour-intensive efforts of a workforce spread across much of the Global South and often subject to exploitation. In enlisting these workers as freelance contractors, micro-tasking platforms sidestep labour regulations such as a minimum wage and a fair contract in favor of terms and conditions they set independently. “What it comes down to […] is a total absence of standards.”
This article from yesterday’s edition of The New York Times highlights how Southeast Asia has become a center of gravity for criminal gangs that force thousands to work for online scam mills under intense surveillance in compounds, often in remote and war-torn places. And how, in Cambodia, the scam industry has been flourishing well within reach of officials – but, because of political connections, no one is acting.
Canada’s corporate watchdog will probe Walmart, Hugo Boss and clothing brand Diesel following allegations the companies exploited the forced labour of China’s ethnic minority Uyghurs. The Canadian Ombudsperson for Responsible Enterprise (CORE) announced its investigation on Thursday after civil society groups last year accused the firms of using Chinese suppliers implicated in forced labour in Xinjiang.
This video of a conversation between ASEAN-ACT, The Indonesian Migrant Workers Union (SBMI) and Indonesia Ocean Justice Initiative (IOJI) discusses how the newly adopted ASEAN Declaration on the Placement and Protection of Migrant Fishers can improve existing regional mechanisms to protect migrant fishers from trafficking and other crimes. SBMI and IOJI were among stakeholders participating in recent discussions to develop the Declaration, which is designed to promote the human rights and fundamental freedoms of migrant fishers.
And the latest country study from ODI, in partnership with ASEAN-ACT, uncovers what makes Lao migrants vulnerable to exploitation and trafficking and how this should be tackled.
This week The Guardian is revisiting its Trafficked podcast series, including the story of a Ukrainian woman who escaped modern slavery in the UK. Since this series was published, the Illegal Migration Act 2023 has passed into law.
USAID Asia CTIP and ReAct have launched TraffickTrace, an online self-learning course designed to develop the capacity of civil society actors in Asia to gather evidence and conduct investigations to support criminal prosecutions and civil legal actions in trafficking in persons cases. The program will focus on new patterns of online recruitment and digital-era trafficking, and will be useful for CSOs and NGO caseworkers as well as lawyers engaged in anti-trafficking investigations.
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