10 things
you need to know aboutlabour trafficking

in the Greater Mekong Sub-region© 2010 World Vision International
Writing and research: Jenny Björk, Abid Gulzar
Reviewers: James East, Laurence Gray, Ruthi Hoffman Hanchett, Annabel Hart, Melissa Stewart, John Whan Yoon
Publication coordination: Heather Elliott, Katie Klopman
Editing, proofreading and design: Inís Communication – www.iniscommunication.com
Front cover image: Many labourers from Myanmar look to commercial fishing in Thailand as a pathway to improve their lives, but like
undocumented and marginalised immigrants everywhere, they are vulnerable to unscrupulous brokers who, for a fee,transfer them to exploitative ship captains. (Photo credit: Kay Chernush, United States Department of State)
Inside cover image: Dara (not his real name) and his brother were trafficked into Bangkok to sell roses to restaurant patrons from 6.00pm
until 6.00am every night. Fed one meal of rice a day, the boys were frequently beaten and burnt with cigarettes if they
did not sell all their roses. They eventually escaped and hid under a bridge until the Thai police found them. (Photo
credit: Khaing Min Htoo/World Vision)
Back cover image:Now, successfully repatriated with their family and community, a trafficked mother and daughter support each other toovercome their memories of exploitation. (Photo credit: Khaing Min Htoo/World Vision)

Printed in Thailand by Thammada Press
Where indicated, names and places have been altered to protect the identities of the victims/survivors of trafficking. Some of the photos
are not of victims/survivors themselves, but rather represent their communities.
All dollar amounts are US dollars. Dollar equivalents are approximate, based on the exchange rate at 18 October 2010.
We acknowledge the kind support and advice provided by Dr Anne Gallagher and Mr Philip S Robertson, Jr; by the Communications Team ofWorld Vision East Asia Regional Office; by members of the Regional Advocacy anti-Child Trafficking Project (RACTP); and by the leadershipof World Vision Offices of the Greater Mekong Sub-region (GMS), without which this publication could not have been completed.
World Vision is a Christian relief, development and advocacy organisation dedicated to working with children, families and communities toovercome poverty and injustice. Motivated by our Christian faith, World Vision is dedicated to working with the world’s most vulnerable
people. World Vision serves all people regardless of religion, race, ethnicity or gender.

Contents
Introduction  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  4
10 things you need to know about labour trafficking .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 81. Men are trafficked onto fishing boats and held as prisoners  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 92. ‘Legal’ recruitment agencies can be complicit in trafficking .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 14
3. Human trafficking is a clandestine crime and victims can be difficult to identify .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 19
4. ‘3D’ jobs fuel demand for trafficked labour in the GMS .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 21
5. Vulnerable domestic workers are exploited in private homes  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 26
6. Some factories hold workers against their will with no pay .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 30
7. Some victims of labour trafficking are exploited not in foreign countries, but on their home soil .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 34
8. Trafficking is a dynamic crime; brokers are flexible and inventive .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 36
9. Trafficked men are less likely to receive assistance and care .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 42
10. Everyone can help to combat labour trafficking!  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 47
What is World Vision doing to combat labour trafficking in the GMS? .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 52
Glossary of legal terms  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 53
Useful websites  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 56
References .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . 58

Introduction
This publication features stories from women, men andchildren who were trafficked for labour exploitation. We hopethat it will help improve your understanding of the true natureof human trafficking. Since statistics are scarce, these stories
provide insight into methods and forms of trafficking, as well as
possible hot-spots in the Greater Mekong Sub-region (GMS)
and the changing nature of the crime.

Tell me something I don’t know…
It is increasingly being accepted that forced labour is the mostcommon form of human trafficking. Labour trafficking cantake the form of forced labour, bonded labour, debt bondage
and sweatshop labour. In the Asia Pacific region there areapproximately three trafficked persons per 1,000 inhabitants.1
It is estimated that for every trafficked person subjected toforced prostitution, nine people are forced to work.1
Labour trafficking is made possible by a constant supply of
unscrupulous employers willing to exploit workers, often
foreign and undocumented migrants. These workers often
become vulnerable in their own countries due to lack of
employment opportunities, discrimination, corruption,
violence, war or political conflict. Instead of being correctly
identified and supported, trafficked victims are either
summarily deported or detained in jails, shelters and4

immigration centres2 and prosecuted for status offencessuch as illegal immigration or illegal work.

Labour trafficking in the Greater Mekong
Sub-region (GMS)
Migration has shaped the GMS* and brings many social andeconomic benefits, both for the migrants’ countries of origin
and destination countries. With limited opportunities forsafe and legal migration in the GMS, there is widespread
irregular migration, creating a fertile breeding ground for the
exploitation of workers.
Trafficking has been said to be “the perfect business”. 3 The
supply of vulnerable people is constant, there are low risksof punishment or arrest, and there are high, continual profits
because a victim can be exploited for years on end.
In the GMS, a great number of trafficked persons end up
in involuntary servitude, bonded labour, debt bondage,
and/or slave-like conditions in the labour sector. Theyfind themselves in factories and sweatshops, on farms and*The GMS countries comprise Cambodia, China, Lao PDR, Myanmar, Thailand andVietnam.

Victims of trafficking often are denied access to informationor services that could help them.

however, remains primarily on trafficking for sexual
exploitation. Trafficking for labour exploitation is generally
still not considered as severe a crime as trafficking forsexual exploitation, and there is a high level of impunity
for offenders. Victims of labour trafficking are often not
identified as such, and instead are detained and deported
from the country where the exploitation took place. As aresult, the majority of trafficked persons do not have accessto assistance or to justice, and the traffickers remain free to
exploit others.

Mechanisms to monitor the labour sector are generally not
in place, allowing employers to hire local and foreign labour
without proper contracts and to confiscate identity papers,
while ‘recruitment agencies’ forge papers to conceal thetrue ages of children. Foreign workers are especiallyvulnerable, as governments and citizens tend to disregard
their right to protection.4

Fortunately, increasing attention is now being given to labour
exploitation, and victims of labour trafficking are starting
to be acknowledged and protected. The recently released
U.S. Department of State Trafficking in Persons Report 20101
reflects a broader trend in acknowledging the significanceof the problem of trafficking for labour exploitation, andemphasises the need for action.

construction sites, in the fishing industry and in private
homes. Victims are often physically and mentally abused,
and lack medical treatment, health care and social services.
They are forced to work to pay off inflated ‘debts’, andare generally not allowed to leave their work premises orcontact anyone outside the workplace – a situation that is
especially dire on fishing boats.

Lack of action on labour trafficking
Ten years after the adoption of the Protocol to Prevent,
Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Womenand Children, supplementing the UN Convention against
Transnational Organized Crime5 (known as the United Nations(UN) Trafficking in Persons or ‘TIP’ Protocol), significant
national and regional efforts, by governments, internationalorganisations and non-government organisations (NGOs),
have been taken to combat trafficking.* The emphasis,*For example, the Coordinated Mekong Ministerial Initiative against Trafficking(COMMIT) to enhance cross-border cooperation to combat human trafficking. In
October 2004, the governments of Cambodia, China, Lao PDR, Myanmar, Thailand
and Vietnam signed the first sub-regional Memorandum of Understanding on humantrafficking in Asia and the Pacific; in March 2005 they adopted a comprehensive
Sub-regional Plan of Action (SPA); they now meet every year to review national
implementation of anti-trafficking initiatives.

5International frameworks and legislation
There is no single, agreed definition of ‘labour trafficking’.
The term generally describes those forms of trafficking inpersons for which the exploitative purpose relates to a person’slabour. Frequently it is used to signal that the exploitation
takes place somewhere other than in the commercial sex
industry.6 The distinction is not, however, always clear-cut:
for example, women trafficked into domestic servitude
may also be sexually exploited. Definitions of trafficking inpersons in domestic legislation vary in GMS countries, andlabour trafficking is not specifically defined. The criminal
justice response in many countries is focused on recruiters,
brokers and transporters as trafficking offenders, rather
than end exploiters. This ignores those who carry out
and profit greatly from the exploitation of human beings.
Trafficking legislation that follows the UN TIP Protocol
definition extends to end exploiters.
For the purposes of this publication, we will use the definitionin the UN TIP Protocol to define human trafficking. One
thing is clear in the Protocol: the core feature of all humantrafficking is exploitation.
Article 3 states:(a) ‘Trafficking in Persons’ shall mean the recruitment,
transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of persons, bymeans of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion,
6of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power
or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of
payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having
control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation.
Exploitation shall include, at a minimum, the exploitation of
the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation,
forced labour or services, slavery or practices similar to slavery,
servitude or the removal of organs;(b) The consent of a victim of trafficking in persons to the intended
exploitation set forth in subparagraph (a) of this article shall beirrelevant where any of the means set forth in subparagraph(a) have been used;(c) The recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt
of a child for the purpose of exploitation shall be considered‘trafficking in persons’ even if this does not involve any of themeans set forth in subparagraph (a) of this article;(d) ‘Child’ shall mean any person under eighteen years of age(Appendix 2).
The three elements of ‘action’, ‘means’ and ‘purpose’ inparagraph (a) must all be present for a situation to constitutetrafficking. The only exception to this is where the victim is achild – in which case only the initial action and the exploitative
purpose must be present. It is important to note that thedefinition does not require ‘movement’: the first element
is satisfied if one of the identified actions, for example‘harbouring’ or ‘receipt’, is present. This has the effect ofextending the definition to include (provided other elements
are satisfied) the holding of an individual in a situation of
exploitation or with an intention to exploit that person.

Methodology
10 things you need to know about labour trafficking isbased on analysis of secondary resources, which includes
research reports, project reports, news clippings from UN
sources, NGOs, international organisations and the media,
and over thirty case stories of survivors of labour trafficking.
World Vision staff implementing anti-trafficking projects in
GMS countries selected these stories to illustrate specificcharacteristics within the trafficking continuum.
In this publication, different forms of labour trafficking will
be highlighted. We will reflect the slave-like conditions thatmany trafficked persons have to endure, in order to increaseknowledge and to trigger debate and discussion on labour
trafficking in GMS countries.
Migration and trafficking are closely linked and the stories
told here connect the issues and reveal that most of thepeople who ended up victims of trafficking started out
believing that they were on their way towards a better life;
not only for themselves, but also for their families. Survivorsof trafficking explain that they were recruited through bothinformal recruitment processes, as well as exploitative
formal recruitment agencies.

Dai Wja (15) from Myanmar was a victim of trafficking. With World Vision’s help
she is learning hairdressing and is slowly recovering from her traumatic past.“WhenI get out of the shelter I will not go back to work in food shops or anywhere. I’ll
become a hairdresser and take care of my family,” she says. (Photo credit: Mathira)7

10thingsyou need to know

aboutlabourMany undocumented migrants – women, men and children –from Myanmar enter Thailand in search of work – often luredby
8 traffickers. (Photo credit: Alan Morison/phuketwan)

trafficking

1

Men are trafficked onto fishing boats andheld as prisoners

When trafficking first emerged as a global issue in the
mid-1990s, the focus was almost exclusively on the crossborder sexual exploitation of women and children withlittle or no attention to the situation for men. Fortunately,
this is changing and males are now being acknowledged
and recognised as victims of trafficking in legislation and innational responses.
Men are the vast majority of persons identified as trafficked in
the fishing industry, one of the most lucrative export industriesin Thailand, estimated at $4.8 billion in 2005.7
Almost all the GMS countries now have trafficking laws or
penal code provisions that cover male victims of trafficking.8
Thailand also has taken specific steps to improve the fishingindustry, by setting up a National Sub-Committee on Fishing
Labour. However, most countries still lack sufficient legislation
to cover all sectors, and laws covering domestic workers andfishermen remain inadequate.9
In 1989, Typhoon Gay resulted in more than 200 fishing boats
sinking and caused the deaths of nearly 500 Thai fishermen. As
a consequence, Thai workers were no longer willing to workin fishing, and the industry began recruiting foreign workers
from neighbouring countries to fill the demand for work.
There continues to be a severe labour shortage in the region's
fishing industry because of the hard and dangerous nature of thejob. Workers on boats report being deprived of food and sleep9
and having to use dangerous, heavy equipment. Workers are often
forced to be out at sea for months or years at a time. Physicalabuse and threats are common and workers who try to resist or
who become sick have been killed or thrown overboard to die.
Current information indicates that the vast majority of victims
trafficked into the fishing industries of Malaysia and Thailand
are adults and older male children from Cambodia, Lao PDR
and Myanmar. Increasing numbers of first-hand accounts explain
how men are lured by local brokers, who convince them to go to
Malaysia or Thailand, usually on the promise of well-paid jobs onplantations, in construction or other sectors. When they reachthe destination country they are locked up and eventually soldto fishing boat captains. Some trafficking survivors interviewed
in Myanmar reported ending up on fishing boats after being
persuaded, or even drugged, by sex workers.
9Their stories tell us that they endured months on boats in harshconditions, isolated from the rest of the world. The only option they
had to escape was to jump overboard and be at the mercy of thesea. Tragically, there have been cases of men jumping overboard to
swim to land, only to be re-trafficked into more exploitative labour.
A few lucky ones are rescued by other boats and coast guards.
In February 2010, five trafficked Cambodian men jumped into
the sea to escape a fishing boat after the murder of one of theirfellow Cambodian workers on board; they were assisted by theInternational Organization for Migration (IOM) after reaching
East Timor. They had been promised construction jobs inThailand, but found themselves trapped on board.10,11 In this casethe men were able to escape and find assistance, but countlessothers suffer unnoticed, with no way out of their dire situations.
Contracts are generally verbal* and men are rarely paid until
the agreement is fulfilled; brokers often claim a portion of
the payment.
One of the issues authorities face upon finding a potential victimof labour trafficking is that fishermen are often unwilling topress charges. They go through an often lengthy investigation
with little expectation of securing justice or compensation, andso usually just want to return home. Without victim testimony,*A study on trafficking into the Thai fishing industry identified that none of theinterviewed fishermen from Cambodia, Myanmar and Thailand had ever had a written
contract. See Robertson 2009.
†10

See www.licadho-cambodia.org.

authorities are usually unable to prosecute offenders – whomay be influential people. As a result, they continue their
exploitation with impunity.
Between June 2007 and December 2008, 49 Cambodian
trafficked fishermen were interviewed after they had all been
trafficked onto Thai fishing vessels and either had been rescued
or had escaped. Of the 49 men, 18 per cent had been children
when recruited and forced onto the vessels.12 All of them had
experienced debt bondage to Cambodian and Thai brokers.
Local and international organisations are actively working toassist trafficked fishermen and are reporting an increase in
the number of cases coming to their attention. For example,
Cambodian human rights organisation LICADHO† assisted 60
trafficked fishermen in the 18 months up to May 2010, and Thai
NGO the Mirror Foundation worked with 138 fishing industryrelated cases in 2009, three times higher than the year before.13
It is timely to put this issue high on the anti-trafficking agenda– to conduct research and to make sure that efforts are madeto assist victims and prevent more men from being trafficked
into the fishing industry.
World Vision’s work in Thailand includes assistance to men intrafficking situations, and trafficking prevention aimed at men.
In Myanmar, World Vision, as part of the inter-agency Human
Trafficking Working Group, has initiated advocacy to relevant
government officials to improve assistance for male victims
using a rights-based approach.

Sold
for

$650

When he left home five years ago at the age of 16, Kyaw
Win* vowed that he would never return – he had his own
serious and secret reasons for that decision.
Born in the city of Myeik, a well known fishing port insouthern Myanmar, Kyaw and his friends jumped on a local
commercial fishing boat as soon as he finished primaryschool. Pretty quickly he heard he could earn 4500 baht($150) a month across the border, in Ranong, Thailand.

“I realised that I’d been cheated. So I started wandering
hopelessly on the city’s streets,” says Kyaw.
As an undocumented migrant worker he was not used tobeing in the foreign city, but his distress was so deep hedidn’t care about the police. He thought it would be betterto be arrested than work as an unpaid slave.

Vulnerable to traffickers
Soon arrested by Thai police, Kyaw was handed overto an armed gang of traffickers who operated inside
Myanmar at Myawaddy, a bustling border town. Brokers
paid the gang an unknown amount of money for Kyaw
and a fellow illegal migrant.

“I called my home and learnt that my family had moved toanother town.” Kyaw says these were the last words heheard about his family.

Herded into the jungle with ten other migrant workers hewalked “with little food or sleep” for nearly ten days to reacha small Thai town, where the same brokers from Myanmar
sold him to Thai brokers who then sold him to a fishing boatowner for 20,000 baht ($670).

After eight months, he was on the move again with hopesof a promised 6500 baht a month salary in Samut Sakhon, aport town in the Gulf of Thailand. But the promised money
didn’t materialise; in fact, he was paid no salary.

The boat, run by Thais, operated illegally in Indonesian
territory. Kyaw was pleased to join four other Myanmar
workers as a fisherman, but he learned rapidly that the boat
was worse than an 18th century slave boat.

*real name protected“They allowed us to sleep only about one hour per day.
There were Thais and Khmer people on the boat but they
got better treatment than us [from Myanmar]. Controlled11

by a crew with guns, Kyaw says he and fellow slave-migrants
from Myanmar were treated “as animals”.
After six months on the Thai fishing boat, Kyaw and fivefriends jumped into the water, in the middle of the night. The
friends, who all had life jackets on, hoped to stay together
but waves separated them. Hours later, at daybreak, Kyaw
was picked up by an Indonesian fishing boat.
“My tired limbs drove me to float with no direction,” Kyaw
recalled. “When they pull me up onto their boat, I couldn’t
stand on my feet. I was nearly blacking out.”
Kyaw's friends had also been rescued by other Indonesianboats and together they were sent to the closest port ofBali where they waited in immigration detention for a year.
Though he was treated well, Kyaw had no idea what was goingto happen next. His only hope was a telephone number for
the Myanmar Immigration Office in Jakarta. Living on a daily
allowance of 5000 rupiah ($0.55), the friends skipped meals
to buy phone cards. They called that telephone number
numerous times, each desperate to go home.
Finally, a Myanmar official responded and soon after they weretaken to the airport – nearly eighteen months after Kyaw
and his friends had their watery escape. They were flown
to Yangon. Sitting on a bed in a social welfare centre, Kyaw
wanted only one thing: to go back home as soon as possible.

12

One week later, World Vision traced his family in Kawthaung,southern Myanmar, and flew Kyaw home. World Vision also
supported his reintegration with his family, giving him asecond chance at life.
“I’m really happy to get back to Myanmar. I really thank you all[at World Vision] for helping me,” he said, with a smile. When
asked if he would go back to Thailand, he gave no reply.

Recommendations:
1. Anti-trafficking legislation in GMS countries should bein compliance with international standards, and should
include specific protection measures for male victims of
trafficking on commercial fishing boats.
2. Authorities must be empowered to pursue prosecution,even when offenders are influential. Victims and witnessesof trafficking and their families should be protected andfully supported.
3. Governments of the destination countries should
undertake a comprehensive review and revision of laws
regulating the fishing industry, to ensure that workers oncommercial fishing boats are provided with proper labour
contracts and decent working conditions.
4. States should ensure that labour protection officers areequipped with greater resources to conduct regularinspections of fishing boats before they go fishing andupon their return.
5. Governments, UN and non-government agencies ofboth origin and destination countries should improve
dissemination of proper pre-departure information
packages for potential migrants in the GMS, based on thereal experiences of victims. Coordination with local antitrafficking committees and relevant agencies should be
strengthened in order to avoid overlap, and gaps in awarenessraising, while still ensuring the effective dissemination of
information to prevent further victimisation.

Myanmar migrant workers unload fish at Ranong fishing pier, the only publicpier in the province. (Photo credit: Mathira)132‘Legal’ recruitment agencies can becomplicit in trafficking

It is generally believed that ‘legal’ labour migration is safe andsecure, especially when it takes place using formal recruitment
agencies, public authorities or licensed employers. But thereality is that some recruitment agencies deceive innocent
people through tactics such as advancing exploitative loans, notproviding proper contracts to clients and falsifying the age ofyoung people by forging identification papers. These practices
put children and adults in unsafe and exploitative situations.
If recruitment agencies are not fully regulated, there are few
measures in place to prevent the recruitment of children incountries such as Cambodia. Families and communities often
lack clear information on the companies or the risks being
taken, and local brokers often collude with local officials andparents to falsify ages. World Vision works with communities
to build the resilience of young people and mobilise local
leaders to be more proactive in protecting children.
Many Cambodian prospective migrants are promised highsalaries and decent employment by recruitment agencies,
but end up in exploitative labour situations in domestic workand sweatshops – later returning home without any money.
The brokers earn significant sums of money for the workers
14

they recruit and are therefore eager to tell only the successful
stories of migration.14 The victims or their families are often
charged for these costs, paying up to five months’ salaryto the recruiting agency after work commences.14 So even
before departure, most of the victims already have accrued asignificant debt to be paid to the recruitment agencies.
In 2010, the number of Cambodians leaving for employment
abroad increased. During the first quarter of the year, 3,000
Cambodian labour migrants went to Malaysia through legal
channels, 2,350 of whom were women. This number was
nearly double that for the first quarter of 2009, and theyearly figure tripled from 3,432 in 2008 to 9,682 in 2009.15
The reported number of recruitment agencies in Cambodia
also doubled from 11 in 2009 to 22 in 2010, including two
NGOs that are allowed to recruit workers for Malaysia andThailand.15 Many unlicensed recruitment agencies give thelicensed ones a bad name. It is more likely that unlicensed
recruitment agencies are involved in human trafficking, butsome licensed agencies have been involved in the crime.
Recruitment agencies are profit-driven and some caremore about the money workers can generate than abouttheir well-being or safety. Workers can be charged fees of
up to $700 for the recruitment services and ‘pre-departure
training’.† These are huge sums of money given that many
common jobs in Cambodia pay around $2 per day.*
Today, the enforcement of national laws and policies that
regulate recruitment agencies are very weak. The hiring of
migrant workers should be done through public authorities– government agreements, or authorised private agencies.16
Unless employers and/or recruitment agencies are licensed

and monitored by the respective government, workers
cannot be protected from labour trafficking.
Recruitment agencies in Cambodia have been found to use
their own recruitment contracts for domestic workers
and some of these do not correspond to national andinternational labour standards.17 Some recruitment agencies
get workers to sign a contract prior to their pre-departure
training which includes clauses such as:

FOLLOW EMPLOYER’S INSTRUCTIONS AT ALL TIMES!
Don’ts in the employer’s house• Do not use the telephone.
• Do not ask for leave/rest days.
• Do not speak to neighbours.
• Do not ask for change of employer.
• Do not mix with men.
• Do not leave the house without your employer’s permission.

†

Conditions like these are oppressive
and unfair. They potentially compromise
many of the rights that are recognisedby all States and the international
community, including the right tofreedom of opinion, expression,
movement and association; the rightto fair and just conditions of work; andthe prohibition on forced labour andarbitrary detention.

See the country narrative for Cambodia in U.S. Department of State 2010.

*The daily wage of construction and wood workers in Cambodia is approximately $2 and garment workers earn about $50 per month (See Building and Wood Workers
International (BWI) - http://www.bwint.org).

15

Mother accused ofsending minor to work
A mother accused of sending her under-age daughter to a
recruitment training centre has been arrested, along with a man
accused of brokering a deal for the girl’s placement, a police
official said yesterday.
Police said 43-year-old mother Ly Yan and 28-year-old broker Kao
Setha were arrested on Friday after officials at the recruitment firm
VC Manpower filed a complaint accusing them of falsifying documents
in order to submit Ly Yan’s daughter, 16, to a training programme thatwould prepare her to work as a domestic aid in Malaysia.
“While the girl was spending her month at the company [fortraining], the company found out that the girl’s real age was 16,”
said Keo Thea, director of the municipal Bureau of Anti-Human
Trafficking and Juvenile Protection. “And it was learned that thesuspects lied about the girl’s real age and background to makeher appear to be legally able to work in Malaysia.”

16“We are now working on the case for which we have already laidcharges…but we cannot say what the charges are because thecase is now being investigated,” he said.
On August 16, police officials said that the director of a VC
Manpower training centre in Sen Sok district evaded arrest andwent into hiding after he was accused of mistreating a trainee
under his care. Pol Khemra, deputy director of the Department of
Police at the Interior Ministry, said yesterday that police are stillon the hunt for the man. VC Manpower also came under scrutiny
last month when a woman fled one of its training centres andsaid she had been held against her will. Days later, authorities
announced that they had found 24 under-age girls being trainedby the company. The Labour Ministry initially barred the firmfrom recruiting clients, but absolved it of wrongdoing soon after.

According to a 1994 sub-decree on migrant labour, trainees mustbe at least 18 years old before being sent to work abroad.

Oum Mean, a secretary of state at the Ministry of Labour,
said yesterday that the ministry had held a training session
for recruitment companies on Friday. He said more than 30
representatives from the companies attended the seminar, atwhich they discussed the laws pertaining to migrant labour andwere reminded “to obey the ministry’s regulations and principles
related to trainee ages, requirements for training centres anddepartures to Malaysia,” he said.

Meas Chanpiseth, deputy prosecutor at the Municipal Court, said
yesterday that charges had been laid against both the mother andthe broker, but declined to elaborate further.

Reported by Khuon Leakhena and Chrann Chamroeun.
‘Mother accused of sending minor to work’, The Phnom Penh
Post, Cambodia, 24 August 2010.

Afterof hard work,

four years
she returned homewith little
for herlabourVotey lived with her mother and sister in Prey Veng,
Cambodia. She came from a poor family and was forced todrop out of school in her early teens to move to Kompong
Cham, Cambodia to be a silk weaver. At home in Prey
Veng, a broker working for a recruitment agency promised
her mother that employment could be secured for Votey
as a domestic worker in Malaysia with a monthly salaryequivalent to $180 plus benefits. Without hesitation, hermother agreed to go with her two daughters.
The company that recruited Votey and her family was
responsible for processing the travel documents, andVotey’s age was increased from 17 to 27 to fit employment
requirements. Her mother’s and sister’s ages were also falsified
to suit the criteria. The three were taken to Phnom Penh toundergo medical exams and when they passed, they signed acontract and were placed in a training centre. Votey reported
that at the training centre she did not get enough to eat, andthe food was poor quality, not nutritious and tasteless.
For more than five months, they learned the Malay language
and the skills that they would require for the job. Then, one
after another, they were sent to different homes in Malaysia.
Even though all three family members worked in Malaysia, they
were unable to contact each other. Votey changed employers
eight times during the first two years and often encounteredexploitative and abusive situations during her time in Malaysia.
Sometimes she was not given enough to eat by the houseowners; there was at least one employer who attempted
to sexually assault her. While she did not suffer physicalabuses by her bosses, she was beaten by a Cambodian female
trainer in Malaysia when she was referred to the centre for arefresher course. She also had long working hours with little
time to rest. She was not allowed to leave the house, but was
expected to be on stand-by at all times.
Votey reported the following: “There was a house owner
who sold drinks at a market. I was required to work fromearly morning to midnight every day. Apart from householdchores, I was also a shop assistant even though my contractstated that I was a housemaid and not a shop assistant.
Whenever I took a little rest, I was scolded. Despite all myhard work, I did not get enough to eat.”

17

The company re-calculated her salary at $130 per month,payable once every two years. Then, after four years, she wastold she owed the recruitment agency four months of her salary.
She would have earned approx $5,720 after this deduction($130 x 44 months). But then the company made further
deductions and at the end of four years she had been paid only
$1000 – which she used to return home.

Recommendations:
1. Governments should strengthen licensing and monitoring
systems for recruitment and placement services.
Individuals and companies breaching labour standards
should be subject to sanctions that reflect the seriousnessof these offences.
2. GMS governments should introduce codes of conduct
for recruitment agencies. Training, awareness-raising andadvocacy should follow the introduction of the codes ofconduct to ensure better implementation.
3. GMS governments should ensure the provision andmonitoring of pre-departure training, information andorientation about relevant laws.

18

Mai is learning new skills and recovering from her very bad experience of working
as a maid for five years in a Bangkok apartment. (Photo credit: Vanhlee Lattana)

3

Human trafficking is a clandestine crimeand victims can be difficult to identify

Law enforcement agencies are responsible for collecting
evidence on an alleged trafficking crime and determining if aperson is a victim of trafficking or not. Under the international
legal definition, labour exploitation that amounts to forced
labour or services, servitude, slavery or practices similar toslavery, is sufficient to satisfy the third ‘purpose’ element of theoffence. Yet victims of labour trafficking are often overlooked,
and laws designed to protect them are not enforced. Victims oflabour trafficking often do not consider themselves as victims;
they are not aware of laws, regulations and mechanisms thatcan protect them. If they are undocumented migrants, theyfear authorities and are reluctant to press charges out offear of being detained and deported. This makes criminal
investigations difficult, since prosecutions often depend on thetestimony of trafficked persons.
GMS governments have committed themselves to strengthening
legal frameworks, law enforcement, justice systems, and the*The Coordinated Mekong Ministerial Initiative Against Human Trafficking (COMMIT)
Memorandum of Understanding was signed by the GMS governments in 2004.
See articles 1, 7, 9, 11, 12 and 13, and Project Proposal Concept 4 of the COMMIT
Sub-regional Plan of Action II.

capacity of their national law enforcement agencies to enforce
trafficking legislation.* This commitment extends to all formsof trafficking involving men, women and children.
Timely and accurate victim identification is often extremely
difficult in situations of labour trafficking. In a factory or on aconstruction site, there may be no outward signs separating
trafficked persons from regular workers. It is essential thatfrontline officials such as police and labour inspectors are capableof identifying persons who may have been trafficked. This isparticularly important in view of the fact that trafficked persons
often do not speak the language of the destination country. They
cannot easily access help and are vulnerable to being misidentified
as illegal migrants and detained or deported.
Law enforcement officials lack tools and information to help themdistinguish labour trafficking victims. A special ‘checklist’ using
agreed international standards and a human rights framework
could be a useful tool. It can help law enforcement officers
identify victims of trafficking in the labour sector. Such a checklist
needs to include area-specific information on recent trends inmovement and ‘hot-spots’ for trafficking and labour exploitation.
It should include questions to ask or signs to observe in order tohelp law enforcement agencies to identify victims.
19

“Only after

I got home

was I recognised

as having been

trafficked”

Ko Htet*, a 14-year-old boy, and his 20-year-old sister Than
Than told their stories at a district-level youth forum in
Myanmar. Ko Htet recalled how a broker sold him to work on afishing boat for a year, off the coast of Thailand, while his elder
sister was sold to the boat owner to work in his small shop.
While Than Than was paid a reasonable wage which helped
support her family back home, Ko Htet was not so lucky. He
did not get paid at all. Being a slightly-built boy, he could not
manage the hard heavy work, and had the terrifying experienceof seeing his co-workers thrown into the sea when they could
no longer work as hard as the boss demanded. He completely
lost contact with his sister; even though they both worked forthe same man they were unaware of each other’s whereabouts.
Both of them managed to run away from their employer, and met
up a few months later. But Than Than’s husband and their cousin
were left behind so they have lost contact with them both.
*real name protected

20

They managed to make it back home across the border bypaying another broker using Than Than’s hard-earned savings.
It was only when they told their stories at the youth forum
that they were recognised as having been victims of trafficking.
World Vision Myanmar’s anti-trafficking programme conducts
training to warn other would-be migrant workers of thepotential dangers.

Recommendations:
1. GMS governments should develop victim identification
tools and train officials (frontline and specialist police/
immigration/labour inspectors/marine police) to identify
victims of trafficking, especially labour trafficking. Suchprocesses should be understood by caregivers, concerned
agencies and community-based groups so that they can
support the initial screening process. Computer-basedand even mobile phone-based technologies could improve
the tracking and identification of victims.
2. A child-centred and rights-based approach should beapplied in the efforts to identify and handle traffickedpersons. For example, trafficking victims should not be
detained and deported, and investigations should be madeswiftly to ensure the safety and protection of the victims.
3. GMS governments should promote citizen action to reportpossible cases of trafficking and improve the responsivenessof law enforcement agencies to such reports.

4‘3D’ jobs fuel demand for traffickedlabour in the GMS

Around the globe, ‘3D jobs’ – dirty, dangerous anddemeaning – are often filled by migrant workers. In the
GMS there are many industries using migrant workers to filljobs that local citizens are unwilling to take. There are some
sectors of employment where the 3D jobs are particularly
prevalent in the GMS: fishing, agriculture, manufacturing,
construction, and domestic work. Children and young
people are often recruited for domestic household work,
agricultural work, and for the fishing and shrimp processing
industries. Because these jobs are often unregulated,
dangerous and undesirable to most people, they become abreeding ground for trafficking.
There are many stories of women, men and children being
trafficked in the agricultural sector in Malaysia and Thailand.
However, there is a lack of official data on this. Agriculture
is one of the most hazardous sectors of employment: out of
335,000 fatal workplace accidents globally each year, nearly
half are in the agricultural sector.18
On farms and plantations, work is extremely difficult. The
workers are exposed to weather extremes, work long hours
hauling heavy loads and using dangerous equipment, and they

are also exposed to toxic pesticides. Along with domestic
work, work on plantations is the least desirable becauseof the harsh nature of the work. The differences between
documented and undocumented workers are significant. In
the agriculture sector, Thai workers and legally registeredmigrants make 3,000–4,000 baht ($100–135) per month,while an unregistered migrant has an approximate monthly
wage of 1,000–1,500 baht ($33–50).19
The International Labour Organization (ILO) Convention
No. 184 on Safety and Health in Agriculture sets theminimum age at 18 for jobs categorised as dangerous, and16 for other farm jobs. Yet as much as 60 per cent of thetotal number of child labourers is found in the agriculture
sector. 20
Over the past decade, the manufacturing sector has expanded
rapidly in most of the GMS. In many GMS countries, such
expansion has been fuelled by relocation of foreign companies
seeking to benefit from lower labour costs. There are manystories of both cross-border and internal trafficking tosweatshops. It is common for boys and girls to end up in
exploitative labour situations in sweatshops.21 The salaries in21

factories are 5,500 baht ($180) per month for Thai workers,
3,000 baht ($100) and above for registered migrants, and
1,000–3,000 baht ($33–100) for unregistered migrants.19 This
makes it clear that unscrupulous factory owners can makesignificant amounts of money hiring undocumented workers.
In Vietnam the exploitation of child labourers is common
in the garment industry. “That is just a normal thing,other facilities also do [this]…It is because we are doing
subcontracting work for low prices,” the wife of a Vietnamese
factory owner claims.22 The use of child labour is common
among employers who want to keep the costs low andhave more control of their workers. According to a survey
conducted in Ho Chi Minh City by the Ministry of Labor,
Invalids and Social Affairs, 62 out of the 172 local production
facilities were found to use child labourers, with up to 50 per
cent of the workers being younger than 15.

The Better Factories Cambodia project was initiatedin 2000 by ILO; it has been successful in helping theprivate sector, especially the garment sector, toimprove working conditions in textile and garment
factories in Cambodia as well as decreasing the use ofchild labour. The results are striking and demonstrate
the value of cooperation with business to improve
working conditions.
“International buyers representing 70 per cent of
Cambodian exports in apparel are now actively
participating in the project. The government
decided that participation in the programmeshould be a condition for export, and the country
has successfully created the ‘Cambodia Brand’,
which in turn has boosted competitiveness ofthe country’s industry. Exports have grown by
10 per cent in volume and 20 per cent in value.
Dialogue amongst key stakeholders – government,
employers, workers as well as international buyers– has been crucial to its successes, which include
the generation of over 30,000 jobs, 43 per centunionisation, and a decrease in child labour to below
1 per cent”.
– from 'We’re in business! From Better Factories toBetter Work', reported by the International Labour
Organization23

22

Sokkong, 14, is Sokchan's eldest brother. As his family's main source of labour, his job at the brick factory was lifting clay, 10–15kg at a time, far beyond his strength.

23

From

bricks tobooks
and pens

Sokchan was only six when his parents divorced and his
father left home. To support the family he had to becomea worker at a brick factory. The work was very hazardous,a ‘3D’ job that included lifting clay, and carting, drying andcarrying brick blocks into hot furnaces. Together, the wholefamily of five worked at the factory but earned less than $25
per month. This work is considered one of the worst formsof child labour.
“I know it’s very hard work for my children, I feel their painfrom losing their father at such a young age. Often times,
my tears fall when seeing my children starve,” says Kim
Oun, Sokchan’s 46 year-old mother. Sokchan and his oldest
brother Sokkong, 14, are the main source of income in thefamily. While they have very different personalities andlooks, they are both underweight and under-developed forchildren their age.

24

Sokchan describes the family's daily struggle to secure enoughfood. “Sometimes my brothers and I have to walk as far as
three kilometres away from home to search for fish in canals
along the roadway. With some luck we can return homewith some fish, while on unlucky days we are forced to eat
rice with fish sauce or salt. Only when we get our monthly
salaries can we afford to add pork,” Sokchan says sadly.
All of the family members are well aware of thepotential dangers they face each day at the brickfactory. The children are at risk of getting theirhands caught in clay cutting machines, or otherinjuries from carrying excessive weight. Their jobs
are anything but desirable but they have little choice.
Sokchan’s family have now spent over five years working
in the local brick factory. None of the children attend
school. Sokkong dropped out of school in Year 3, Sokchan
in Year 1 and the other two brothers never attended
school. “I have been thinking about changing jobs, but I
cannot since I have no place to stay and cannot afford
rent. This factory gives us room to stay, and althoughsmall, it’s better than nothing,” says the mother.
Sokchan’s situation is fairly typical of children trapped in
exploitative dangerous labour. Fortunately, thanks to World
Vision’s Combating the Worst Forms of Child Labour
Project, he and his siblings are now attending school andreceiving other assistance to grow and ensure better futures.

Recommendations:
1. Governments of GMS countries should ensure thatlabour inspectors have the knowledge, skills andincentives to effectively monitor high-risk industries
and that they are trained to identify and act on possible
situations of trafficking in 3D jobs.
2. The government and private sector should work together
to regulate and monitor high-risk industries, withindustry-specific standards and codes of practice adopted,
and heavy penalties imposed on industries that violate thelaws and codes of conduct.
3. Governments and NGOs should work to raise employer
awareness of labour standards and the legal rights of
migrant workers. Campaigns should target employers in
the less visible industries such as domestic service.

Sokchan now enjoys his school lessons. (Photo credit: Sopheak Kong/World Vision)25

5

Vulnerable domestic workers are
exploited in private homes

Labour laws in many countries, especially in GMS countries,
still do not fully correspond to the changing labour
environment, leaving room for exploiters to take advantage
of many vulnerable people. One of the areas where legislation
is not keeping up with the reality of life in the GMS is in thedomestic work sector.
Millions of women, men and children are treated as slavesin the homes of people across the GMS and the world.
Domestic workers constitute between five to nine per centof total employment in developing countries, and up to 2.5
per cent in industrialised countries.24 Most domestic servants
work without proper contracts, and are not aware of theirrights. The U.S. Department of State recently highlighted
that migrant domestic workers, who are mainly female, areparticularly vulnerable to exploitation.1
Low pay, long working hours, no regular holidays, few
or no days of rest, confinement, isolation and seizure of
documents25 are just some of the realities domestic workers
face in the GMS. Many domestic workers are forced to workfor 15 to 20 hours per day, sometimes with no days off orpersonal leave. Gender-based discrimination, violence and26

stereotyping are also issues that domestic workers haveto deal with.14 Authorities are unable to inspect private
property as easily as formal workplaces and, as such,domestic workers are particularly vulnerable to exploitation.
When allegations of exploitation are made, governments andlabour monitoring bodies often appear reluctant or unable
to protect workers. Employers are very rarely prosecutedfor abuses against their domestic servants.
Many Cambodian women and girls now migrate to Malaysia
where there is a high demand for workers. But in theabsence of adequate legislation, to protect domestic
workers they often end up in highly exploitative labour
situations. According to the accounts of many survivors of
trafficking recruited by agencies in Cambodia, they were
initially motivated by the agencies who falsely promised
good salaries for very simple jobs like domestic work, orjobs in factories with attractive salaries and working hours.**See Thea’s and Votey’s stories.

In Thailand in 2009, there were 108,000 domestic workers
registered, and 95 per cent of them came from Myanmar.26
However, the laws are not sufficient to protect them. In
Vietnam, on the other hand, the labour code explicitly
includes domestic workers.14
The growing social cost of domestic work is often
overlooked. In many countries, children are domestic
workers instead of attending school. Unregulated domestic
work also allows abuse to take place behind closed doors.
It is commonplace to hear of sexual and physical abuse ofdomestic workers by their employers. Studies elsewherein Asia have reported an increased number of domestic
workers killed during the last decade, and large numbers ofdomestic workers returning to their home countries withsexually transmitted diseases, including HIV.1

La was trafficked into Thailand from Lao PDR, on the promise of good money.
She ended up working as a maid for 16 years of her life, not leaving the house at all.
“I have thrown countless letters tied to a rock across the pond at the backof the house where I was employed asking for help,” she says. (Photo credit:
27
Vanhlee Lattana)Exploitation
behindclosed doors
Thea is 39 years old and has six children. Before going towork as a domestic worker in Malaysia, she sold vegetables
at a small market in Kampong Cham province, Cambodia.
She had a very troublesome husband who often harassed
and abused her. One day, the local agent of a recruitment
agency approached her and offered her an overseas job.
Living in severe poverty, and compounded by the unbearable
treatment from her husband, she took up the offer andabruptly left home for the company’s office in Phnom Penh.
At the company, staff briefly explained the working conditions
to her. Some key aspects that she remembers very well arethat it was a three-year contract, and she was not allowed
to return to Cambodia prior to that. She was to receivea monthly salary equivalent to $130. Food, accommodationand health care would be provided. The person assured herthat the company’s representative would visit her in Malaysia*real name protected28

once every three months. Pushed by the urgent need toescape home and pulled by the attractive offer, she quickly
inked the contract, a copy of which she never received.
Thea was sent to a training centre for eight months. She claims
that her unattractive appearance delayed her departure to
Malaysia. When she was finally sent to Malaysia she reported
being forced to work from 4am to midnight every day. Apartfrom doing household chores which included washing threecars and taking care of two large dogs, she also worked in afactory owned by her employer. She kept the factory clean,
including eight toilets. Monitored by closed circuit television,
she was unable to rest. When she wanted to rest, shepretended to go to the toilet so she could rest for a while.
Despite all the back-breaking work, she was allegedly given
only two ringgit ($0.65) a day for food.
One day she was forcefully sent back for disciplinary actions
to the host agency in Malaysia, which partnered with therecruitment agency in Cambodia. She was punished because
she refused to eat rice given by the boss, which she thought
had been left in a fridge for a week. The staff accused herof being lazy and beat her badly. She was sent back to work
under the same employer.
After about 12 months, her right leg began to swell. Because
the contract did not allow her to resign, she pretended to beseriously sick. She was admitted to hospital for treatment of
her leg and abdomen pain. Once released from the hospital,

she was repatriated to Cambodia without receiving any
payment for her 12 months of service.
Back in Cambodia, she visited the recruitment agency to ask
for her salary. The recruitment agency told her that she owed
it six months’ worth of salary in fees, and that the remaining
six months’ salary had been used to cover her hospitalisationin Malaysia. Thea said she was about to commit suicide on
the spot after hearing this from the recruitment agency staff.
After a serious argument, the agency promised to pay her
two months’ salary but she demanded six months based on
the grounds that she was not supposed to pay for healthcare. Since her training that started in November 2007 until
13 March 2010, she has not yet received payment of any kind.

Recommendations:
1. GMS governments should ensure that labour laws andregulations extend to the domestic service sector. They
should devise effective methods to ensure that workers inprivate homes are adequately protected and have accessto justice.
2. National laws and regulations should require thatdomestic workers be paid at least the national minimum
wage, that they receive rest days, and that their freedomof movement is not curtailed.
3. National laws and regulations should require thatdomestic workers have access to social security, healthcare and maternity insurance.
4. In GMS countries, Ministries of Labour should develop
mechanisms and networks to ensure the required
monitoring and management systems for a protective
working environment for domestic workers, bothin-country and overseas.
5. Governments of GMS countries, UN agencies and NGOs
should raise awareness of basic labour laws and rights
among both employers and employees, in communities
and the private sector.

29

6Some factories hold workers against
their will with no pay

Law enforcement should be one of the major deterrents tothe crime of human trafficking; yet we have a long way togo as a global community in securing an effective criminal
justice response to trafficking. Without proper laws andimplementation, trafficking cannot be prevented andtrafficked persons will not see justice.
While some employers do take care of their workers, many
have no respect for workers’ well-being or rights. Instead,they confiscate workers’ documents and trap them into
performing dirty, dangerous and demeaning labour on thepromise of payment. After two or three years of gruelling
labour, they often give workers a measly payment, fromwhich substantial ‘fees’ from employers and recruitment
agencies have been deducted.
Employers also sometimes alert immigration authorities
about unregistered migrant workers or migrants whose
visas are about to expire. When the workers leave theirworkplace, authorities arrest them for illegally staying in the
country. In cases like this, migrant workers are immediately
detained and deported often without receiving any of theirwages. Those migrants who have entered and/or remained30

legally in the country of destination are often unable to provetheir legal status because their identity documents havebeen confiscated. They have no way of proving their identity
and their ‘right’ to employment in the country and therefore
have no recourse against their employers for compensation.
Recent studies estimate there are between 1.8 and3 million migrant workers in Thailand, of which the
majority are undocumented.24 The vast majority of foreign
workers in Thailand are from Myanmar. Conflict and limited
opportunities in Myanmar push people to cross the borderwith the assistance of local brokers. Many of them end up in
seafood processing factories or in the fishing industry. The
main destination is Samut Sakhon province, where 40 per
cent of all shrimp caught by Thai fishing boats is processed.28
A labour rights group estimated that 200,000 migrants from
Myanmar were working in Samut Sakhon in 2007, with only
70,000 registered as legal workers.29
In September 2006 an extreme case of exploitation against
workers from Myanmar at a seafood factory in Samut Sakhon
in Thailand was reported. It became a prominent trafficking
case that demonstrates the vulnerability of migrant factory

workers to severe exploitation, and the critical importanceof law enforcement. Fortunately, this was one of the cases
where the Thai government’s multi-disciplinary operational
response team worked together and took action to provide
support to victims.
With the strong support of Thai provincial authorities andNGOs, in September 2006, the Thai police raided the factory
where the exploited workers were located. Men, womenand children from Myanmar were literally imprisoned inthis factory with five-metre-high walls topped with razor
wire and patrolled by armed guards. After a thoroughsearch for workers hidden under the locked undergroundcompartment, in the ceiling, between the walls, and in thewater tanks, police were able to rescue around 800 people
out of which 66 were immediately identified as trafficking
victims and brought to government-run shelters on thesame day.
Rescued workers shared stories of an ordeal that
demonstrates extreme violation of human rights and Thai
labour laws. The men, women and children were forced
to work for 18 hours or more every day and were paid as
little as 400 baht per month ($13), out of which they had
to buy food from the factory’s owner. If workers rebelledagainst their situation, they were often publicly humiliated or
tortured and sometimes even raped.
Fishery is one of the main industries in Ranong. The demand for cheap labour
draws ten of thousands of Myanmar, migrant workers to look for work at
fishing piers in Ranong province. (Photo credit: Mathira)31

Men and older boys, especially from Cambodia, Lao PDR and Myanmar havebeen identified as the victims of trafficking in the fishing industry in Thailand
32(Photo credit: Amio Ascension)

In April the same year, another seafood factory wasraided in Samut Sakhon. Shots were fired as police andimmigration officials approached the factory, and morethan 100 migrants from Myanmar tried to escape through acanal. Six workers who could not swim are believed to havedrowned; another 90 were deported back for working as
undocumented migrants, despite the fact that they werelikely to have been trafficking victims. 30
These stories show the need for better monitoring of theshrimp processing sector by labour inspectors and increased
workplace protection. They also show that exploited
migrants do not feel that criminal justice agencies can protect
them. Investigations are necessary to determine if irregular
workers are victims of trafficking in order to determine ifthey should be protected by the trafficking laws instead ofbeing deported.

Recommendations:
1. GMS governments should strengthen and enforce
workplace safety and protection through further
education of labour inspectors on the ‘new trends’ intrafficking, in regards to sectors of employment andgeographical hot-spots.
2. GMS governments should develop a handbook forlabour inspectors to identify suspected industries andcollect evidence of violations, and provide them withrelated training and support for taking action.
3. GMS governments should ensure that factory owners andmanagers who breach labour laws are subject to sanctions
that reflect the seriousness of the offence.

33

7

Some victims of labour trafficking are
exploited not in foreign countries, but on
their home soil

Many still believe that in order for a crime to be definedas trafficking it has to involve movement across a border.
This is not true. Internal trafficking is found in almost all
countries in the GMS. Unfortunately, to date, most legislativeand policy responses, and civil society activity, have been
overwhelmingly focused on cross-border trafficking. Less
attention has been paid to internal trafficking.

in terms of decent accommodation and access to educationand health care.* Vietnamese children from the rural partsof the country fall victim to commercial sexual exploitationin the cities. They are also reported to be exploited
working as beggars, shop assistants and street vendors inurban areas. Cases of forced and bonded labour in familyrun house factories have also been reported.1

Children who are internally trafficked are often pushed or
lured from their communities or villages in rural areas tomigrate to work in urban centres. Insufficient householdincome, poverty, income disparities and other push factors
sometimes force children from their families and into
exploitative forms of child labour.
The rapid economic development in Vietnam has lead toincreased internal migration, mainly from impoverishedrural areas to urban centres with more employment
opportunities. According to some government officials, anestimated 25–30 per cent of the populations of the largest
cities in Vietnam consist of migrants, who face difficulties
34*See the IOM Vietnam website: http://www.iom.int.vn

Finding

freedom
exploitation

after

When he should have been in school, Khin* was working ina private garment shop in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, for
14 months. He worked 14 hours per day, with only one day
off every two weeks and a salary of around $14 per month
before he was rescued in December 2008.
World Vision Vietnam, through a local NGO, the Blue
Dragon Children’s Foundation, supports Khin and otherchildren who were rescued by the foundation. They receive
extra tutoring to help them catch up with school and to startliving a normal life with other children as soon as possible.
Khin tells us a story that is similar to that of many children who
are deceived and forced into exploitative labour in garment
factories, as beggars, at plantations or in other sectors where
workers are forced to work long hours in ‘3D’ jobs.
“When I was working, it was like being in prison. I was notallowed to go out or to keep any money for myself. The
employers forced me to work very hard, almost 14 hours perday. When I got tired and made mistakes, my boss scoldedme terribly. I was in tears when Van [Blue Dragon Children’s*real name protected

Foundation staff member] came to rescue me and helped me
to return home. It was a great joy that I could see my parents,
sisters and brothers, and friends again,” recounts Khin.
Since Khin returned back home he started attending school
again and received extra tutoring. “The tutoring helps me
catch up with other children at school so they do not mockme.” He also received the opportunity to learn drama. He
enjoys his time with his friends instead of working hard in
the garment factory.
“The most significant change in my life, however, is that I
have come to value the freedom that I am having right now.
Now I have time to play and have fun with my friends after
school, even if sometimes my parents complain that I am
playing too much. However, I was rated ‘very good’ at school
last year so I think it is okay to spend time with friends.
Studying is a good thing too, because it is preparing me formy future and it is better than working like a slave.”

Recommendations:
1. GMS governments should collect and analyse data toproperly assess the size and scope of internal trafficking.
2. GMS governments should include internal trafficking
in their anti-trafficking national plans of action, policy
response and trafficking legislation.
3. NGOs and international organisations and UN agencies
should advocate for increased attention to internaltrafficking.

35

8

Trafficking is a dynamic crime; brokers
are flexible and inventive

A broker is a third-party middle man or woman who is paid
to connect people and parties. In GMS countries, brokers
take on different roles depending on the country and theform of exploitation. Brokers often connect migrants with
future employers, either through licensed recruitment
agencies, illegal agencies or via other brokers working inother towns, across borders, or in other areas. In addition
to this, brokers are also those who assist workers to send
remittances19 through irregular channels. The workers are
therefore dependent on brokers providing different services
based on current demands.
Brokers are important players in labour migration
throughout the GMS and not all brokers are criminals.
However, some unscrupulous brokers look for and preyupon people’s vulnerabilities, including low education levels,
impoverished rural families, families experiencing domestic
violence, and dysfunctional or ‘broken’ families, where one
or both parents are dead, missing or suffering from severe
illness. A broker can be anybody – a friend, family member,community member, stranger, a man, a woman. They can beold, young, a local or from abroad.
36

A study of recruitment practices in Cambodia, Lao PDR and
Thailand identified three types of informal brokers:31• Individual brokers who work on their own to recruit
people. These brokers have good connections in thedestination country as well as the country of origin.
They charge for their services through the employers
and are not likely to retain relations with workers after
recruitment has been completed.
• Individual brokers who work for employers. They often
have good connections with recruitment agencies.
They are found working in specific geographical areas
and therefore only have access to a limited amount of
migrants in that area.
• Finally, individual brokers who represent recruitment
agencies in sending countries. These are the brokers
that have the most well-established connections with theworkers.
Other brokers include overseas money transfer brokers
for remittances, job placement brokers, brokers that
secure work permits, brokers that mediate with the police,
brokers that subcontract workers for employers, brokers

that supply fishing boats with workers, loan brokers andbrokers that help migrants with hospital referral. 32 This wide
range of examples clearly shows the variation of brokers
and how some do help migrants, while others prey on theirvulnerabilities.
A UNIAP review of brokers and agents in Samut Sakhon in
200733 found that brokers were from Myanmar and Thailand,
and they work closely with employers and even some law
enforcement officials. When brokers collude with the very
officials who are supposed to be protecting the workers, theworkers lose not only confidence in the authorities, but also
the belief that there are people who are willing to protect
their rights.

Usually, brokers in Myanmar will transport the workers
across the border into Thailand and then the Thai brokers
take over on the Thai side of the border. The broker then‘delivers’ the workers directly to the employer or takes
them to the area (in this case Samut Sakhon), before finding
a local job placement broker at the planned destination.
Some workers pay each broker directly, while others must
start paying off brokers’ fees and transportation costs after
they begin employment. These ‘fees’ can be increased at
the brokers’ discretion. The worker might be told thattransportation costs will amount to 9,000–19,000 baht($300–640), but this sum might be increased, or even doubled,as the migrant workers reach their destination. Many workers
begin employment in substantial debt to their brokers.

What deceptive brokers promised and did not deliver33
Monthly earnings in Thailand promised by brokers to victims

3,000­­–7,000 baht ($86–$200)

Amount actually earned

None or small percentage of promised amountAmount earned by brokers from selling victims toboat owners or captains

10,000–15,000 baht ($287–$431)

Amount earned by intermediary brokers and transporters

1,500–2,500 baht ($43–$72)

Job promised by broker to victim

Usually no specific job is promised. Sometimes factory or
construction jobs are promised.

37

Forms of debt bondage are often used to exploit workers,
whereby payment is withheld to prevent the workers fromleaving the workplace. This practice is commonly used in thefishing industry in Thailand.12
One of the victims (a 21-year-old man from Cambodia)
shares his story. “I could get 6,000 baht ($200) per month,but I had never received my salary. My boss did not give me
my salary and he asked me to wait for next month, again andagain. When I had worked for one year I tried to ask him formy salary. He gave me 20,000 baht ($670) for the whole yearthat I worked for him. I tried to send all of my money to mymother in Cambodia through [the broker]. But [the broker]
did not send my money to my mother, he kept it for himself.”
The trend to subcontract employment services to brokers
has increased the vulnerability of workers. Brokers are usually
responsible for registering workers with the government andarranging health insurance and work permits, but many do
not keep their promises. Reports have shown that migrants
have even been forced to pay the fees themselves – if they
have been registered at all.
Generally, foreign workers are required to carry their
documents when moving around, and their movement
is limited when original work permit documents are
confiscated by brokers. Intimidation is a common practice;brokers often threaten that they will report workers to
the authorities if they seek other employment
38

A case in early 2006 highlights this common scenario, wheretwenty workers from one factory asked to leave and thebroker contacted the police to have them deported. 33 In
other documented cases, where workers wanted to change
employers, they were not given the documents to change
legally and either remained in their harmful work situations
or became illegal workers. 33

This woman in her early 20s was trafficked into a blue jeans sweatshop, where she and other young women were locked in and made to work 20 hours a day, sleeping
on the floor, with little to eat and no pay. She managed to escape and was brought to the government-run Baan Kredtrakarn shelter in Bangkok. After a few days, when
she felt safe enough to tell her story to the director, the police were informed and they raided the sweatshop, freeing 38 girls, aged 14–26. (Photo credit: Kay Chernush
for the U.S. State Department)
39

“I will neverfollow
anybody acrossthe border again”

Tricked by false promises, 13-year-old Noy crossed theborder to help her family earn a better living. Now safely
home again, she teaches her friends about the lies anddangers of labour trafficking.
The hope of earning 3,000 baht (almost $100) per month
was only a dream for a young Lao girl and her parents. For
13-year-old Noy, the other side of the Mekong River seemed
like a land of opportunity.
Born into a poor farming family, Noy and her six siblings lived
in a village deep in the forest of southern Lao PDR. Withno local school to attend and no option to attend school
elsewhere due to the difficulties of travelling, Noy had no
education and no idea of what life outside her village was like.
*real name protected

40

The remote village rarely received any visits from outsiders,
but last February a stranger arrived and announced that
there were easy and well-paid jobs in Thailand, just acrossthe Mekong River. Noy had known many girls and boys
who went to work across the border, so she and her father
believed the man’s lies. “I wanted to help my family and earnsome money so that we could have a better life,” said Noy.
Noy’s father was the head of their village of 13 families,
and had no idea that the man was an unscrupulous broker.
“I knew that my daughter would cross the border towork illegally, but the man persuaded me and told me thateverything would be fine. He said that many people fromother villages had done the same.”
Noy recalled the difficult journey as she travelled out of thevillage for the first time. “He sent three people, including
me,” said Noy. “I was scared and I didn’t know what to do,where was I heading, or what I would I face.”
After crossing the river by night, Noy and the others were
locked in a house and eventually transported to Bangkok
where she was delivered to her new employer. Noy’s ‘job’
was to do housework for a family for three years to repay
the debt paid to the broker. Treated terribly by the ownerand kept locked up in the house, Noy quickly realised sheneeded to escape. “I slept on the hard floor and was given
little food to survive,” she explained.

After just seven days of working, Noy fled. With theequivalent of two dollars in her pocket Noy ended up
in a restaurant where she found a meal, a new job, andeventually help from the police. Assisted by government
officials and World Vision, Noy was able to return to herfamily in Lao PDR.
“I wanted to work to help my family with financial support,
but I will never follow anybody across the border to work on
the other side of the river again,” said Noy.
Noy’s father still wants her to have a job so she can earnmoney, but now he will be more careful about strangers who
approach them, as they may be traffickers. “I don’t want mydaughter to cross the border to work illegally in Thailand,but if there is a job that she could do in a nearby town, I
will check the place out and ensure that it is safe before mydaughter goes to work there,” he said.
For others, the dream of finding work outside of isolated
villages will continue to lure them into labour trafficking as
the opportunities for work and education at home are so
few. To break the cycle of trafficking, it is important that thepeople of the village understand how to identify and avoid
deceptive recruiters.
Through its Mekong Delta Regional Trafficking Strategy
programme, World Vision is working to stop trafficking andto help trafficking survivors by providing support and skills
training to individuals like Noy.
While her surroundings and opportunities have not changed,
Noy’s experiences have given her a new perspective on life.
She now hopes to use her trafficking experience to warnothers in her village about the dangers involved. She sees
herself as an anti-trafficking advocate and is doing all that
she can to ensure that others will not fall into the same trapthat she did.
“It is the best thing I could do for my community,” said Noy.
“I know other young girls would believe the recruiters but I
don’t want this to happen again in my community.”

Recommendations:
1. Governments of the GMS and NGOs should conduct
information and advocacy campaigns to increase
vulnerable people’s awareness of brokers, how they
operate, and the potential risks.
2. National development plans should focus on areas wherehigh levels of migration have been recorded, to provide
vocational training, income generation opportunities,
skills training and safe migration information.
3. Governments and NGOs should undertake research
into trafficking practices in order to ensure quicker andmore accurate identification of exploitative brokers.
41

9Trafficked men are less likely to receive
assistance and care

To date, women and children have been the primary focus in
the response to human trafficking. The prevailing stereotype
which associates men with strength and power means thatmost societies are less likely to consider men as victims,
even when they have been severely exploited.
Men who have fallen prey to traffickers sometimes resist
the label of ‘victim’, too, since “[being] labelled a ‘victim’
may have an impact on how men see themselves, as the term
stands in contrast to social norms of men as caretakers of
their families.”34
An additional problem with regard to masculinity and humantrafficking is that trafficking is often seen as ill-fortune
rather than as a violation of the human rights of individuals.
Indeed, many migrants in GMS countries prefer not to use
the distinctions of ‘legal’, ‘illegal’, ‘exploited’, or ‘trafficked’:
they refer only to ‘lucky’ and ‘unlucky’ migrants. Sincemany choose to migrate, they are viewed as agents making
an active choice and if they are then trafficked, it might
be seen as ill-fortune instead of exploitation. Of course,
trafficking is a human rights violation regardless of how thevictims get into their exploitative situation.
42

Shelters and support centres for survivors of trafficking need
to be safe havens where victims can recover and eventually
integrate back into society. One of the problems in GMS
countries is that there are few shelters and safe houses for
trafficked men where they can access legal support and beoffered mental and physical rehabilitation after their ordeals.
Like female victims, trafficked men also need communitybased reintegration, skills development and individual
consultations based on the needs of each individual.
There is a lack of effective systems to provide support tofishermen who have escaped or been saved from trafficking.
Since most escaping fishermen lack documentation about
their identity and employment, they are generally viewed asillegal migrants and are rarely identified as trafficking victims.
If Thai fishermen make their way back to Thailand, they canfind support in one of the shelters for men. For fishermen
from Cambodia and Myanmar, few services are available.
In Thailand, the Ministry of Social Development and Human
Security opened shelters for men in Chiang Rai, Pathum
Thani, Ranong and Songkhla, provinces where the victims canreceive support in all forms, from meals and medical care tocounselling for themselves and their families.9 Reports frompeople who manage the shelters indicate that fishermen do
not feel comfortable in the shelter environment, and theytend to leave immediately after recovering physically.
As the following story explains, a fisherman from Myanmar
was drugged and ended up being trafficked on a fishingboat. After he escaped, he did not know where to turn, andwas treated as an illegal worker who had to suffer until heeventually made his way home.
Aung Htoo’s* flight from exploitation resulted in his
brother being taken hostage by the trafficking gang and his
mother taking out loans to pay the ransom and rescue her
youngest son.

*real name protected

Aung Htoo* learned first-hand how how easy it was to become a victim oftrafficking. (Photo credit: World Vision Myanmar)
43

Ransomedbyhis broker

Aung Htoo* was 24 years old when he was trafficked into
the fishing industry.
As a teenager, he lived with his father and two younger
siblings in a coastal town in southern Myanmar. In Year 7 hedropped out of school to help his father work at the same
rubber plantation as his father. But he became increasinglyinterested in going to Thailand to work with his mother.
In 2008, aged 23, Aung and his friends went to Kawthaung,a town on the Thai-Myanmar border, where they worked aslabourers at the fish market. Aung also worked as a porterso he could save money for his travel to Thailand. After ayear he saved 6,500 baht ($210), and he and a friend met
with a broker who promised to send them to Thailand. They
handed over their savings for transportation and agent fees
before travelling to Thailand through the jungle and acrossthe river.
On the way to their final destination, Aung and his friend
were handed from one broker to the other. One broker*real name protected

44

urged them to drink a bottle of strange liquid after which
they became drowsy and eventually unconscious.
When they woke up they realised that they were not in
Thailand as they had been promised. Instead, they had been
drugged and brought onto a fishing boat. On this boat,
workers from Myanmar were ill-treated and abused. Unable
to tolerate the abuse and beating, Aung and his friend
escaped when the boat docked in a port.
The broker who had trafficked them onto the fishing boat
contacted Aung’s younger brother and called him to Samut
Sakhon. When his younger brother arrived, the broker
captured him and kept him hostage. Aung was told his
younger brother would to be kept hostage until a ransom
was paid. If he did not arrive with the money, his brotherwould be sold to an Indonesian fishing boat at a price of
35,000 baht ($1,100). Aung’s mother heard this and took out
a loan to rescue her younger son.
Meanwhile, Aung worked odd jobs in Thailand and saved
money for his journey home. Unfortunately, as an illegal
worker, he was frequently captured by corrupt officials who
would take his money so he could not save the fare he needed.
Several months later he finally saved enough to go home.
Two months later, he contacted World Vision and begansharing his experiences as part of an awareness-raisingprogramme. He received livelihood support and now works

in livestock breeding. He has also become a member of the
youth group in his village and actively participates in antitrafficking activities.
Today, Aung is one of Myanmar’s expert anti-trafficking
advocates. His wisdom was painfully learnt when he dared toescape from a violent, abusive, and exploitative fishing boat.
Aung learned just how easy it is to become a victim oftrafficking and knows it happens to boys, men, girls andwomen. He wants people to plan their migration: to learn
basic language skills they can use in their destination country
and to have some employable skills.

Recommendations:
1. The GMS countries should establish support centres andservices recognising the specific vulnerabilities and needsof boys and men. They should be safe, have access to legal
support and reintegration support. Victims, both maleand female, should be able to meet with family and friends
who can be active agents in their recovery. They shouldbe able to work while awaiting repatriation, and be able toleave if they choose to do so.
2. Governments of GMS countries and NGOs should
increase investment in skills development for returnees,
and increase micro-finance opportunities and services attheir doorsteps. Communities and the private sector also
should be mobilised to accept and support sustainable
reintegration.
3. Governments of GMS countries and NGOs should
provide communities with information about alternative
livelihoods and legal migration opportunities to ensurethat they are far less vulnerable to trafficking.

45Young girls recovering from the trauma of being trafficked and sold into commercial
sexual exploitation, write down their sorrow and nightmares of the past on a balloon and
let it fly, a symbol of letting go of the past. (Photo credit: Sopheak Kong/ World Vision)46

10

Everyone can help to combat labour
trafficking!

If one looks at human trafficking from an economic
perspective, it is all about supply and demand. Human
trafficking is a lucrative business. With low costs (sincehumans can be sold over and over again, unlike commodities)
and high profits, trafficking can undercut the prices of
law-abiding companies that choose to pay decent wages
for labour. Companies can contribute to exploitation
without necessarily being aware of it, because of the use of
subcontractors and recruitment agencies down their supply
chain which are hard to monitor: this is a challenge for theaccountability of companies.
International law requires States to ensure that bothcompanies and individuals can be held liable for traffickingrelated offences. Companies can potentially be subject tocivil and criminal action for their involvement in trafficking.
Company officials may also be held individually liable underboth criminal and civil law.
The business community is an important player in the fightagainst human trafficking. Businesses are under increasingpressure to adhere to basic standards of corporate
accountability and corporate social responsibility (CSR).
The business community is encouraged to join NGOs,

governments, civil society and others in the fight against
human trafficking.* Preventive measures for the eliminationof trafficking throughout a company’s entire supply chain are
crucial. Companies must have corporate policies prohibiting
the use of forced labour throughout their supply chains.

What businesses can do
Businesses joining the fight against trafficking can play many
important roles. Here are five good practices for businesses
identified by the End Human Trafficking Now! Campaign.
Setting standards:
Businesses can ensure that their activities do not directly
or indirectly contribute to trafficking by developing andimplementing codes of ethics or conduct across their entire
supply chains. It is essential that compliance with such codes
is regularly monitored and action promptly taken whenproblems are identified.

*See End Human Trafficking Now! Campaign: http://www.endhumantraffickingnow.com/
Businesses_against_human_trafficking/Pages/Businessesagainsthumantrafficking.aspx

47

Ethical trading initiatives:
Through the formation of alliances involving companies,
NGOs and trade unions, efforts can be undertaken to
ensure that codes of labour practice are implemented
across the supply chain, and good practices are identified
and promoted globally.
Raising awareness:
The tourism sector, for example, can inform policy-makers
and the public about trafficking through public service
announcements, in-flight videos, etc. They can informvictims of trafficking of their human rights, support services
and access to justice.
Technical assistance:
By donating software or providing technical support the
telecommunications sector can assist law enforcement in
identifying victims and traffickers.
Social reintegration:
The private sector can train or employ former victimsof trafficking and provide skills training, mentoring, andinternship programmes.
It is important to note that it is not only about the actions
that have to be taken, but also about the gains for companies
that join the fight against trafficking. One of the positive
48

outcomes is that the commitment to CSR and ethical businesscan ensure safe operations of the company, decent work forstaff, better relationships with local communities and a better
corporate image that earns trust and better working relations.
It also protects the brand; by being ethically sound, companies
ensure that their image and reputation is protected.
It is also important to remember that trafficking in persons
is a crime – and corporate change alone cannot replace agovernment’s responsibility to protect and secure justice forvictims and end impunity for offenders.
The World Vision Australia 'Don’t Trade Lives' campaign isan advocacy campaign to unite Australians against humantrafficking and slavery. Don’t Trade Lives examines theissue of labour exploitation, and looks at how consumerpurchasing behaviour relates to the issue. Don’t Trade
Lives seeks to reduce trafficking and slavery by reducing
the market within Australia for products produced throughexploited labour. The activities include:• Encouraging Australians to take action to combat
human trafficking and slavery• Advocating for the Australian Government to ensure
an integrated anti-trafficking policy environment in the
Asia Pacific region• Advocating for the global chocolate industry toeliminate exploited labour from cocoa production
by 2018.

Recommendations:
1. The private sector, government and NGOs should
work together more closely to increase corporate
accountability.
2. The private sector should adopt fair trade businesspractices by adopting policies that commit to:• eliminating all forms of forced and compulsory labour,and child labour;• taking responsibility for all the labour in their supply
chain, and pledging to monitor compliance, remediate
non-compliance, and verify those actions by anindependent third party;• honouring the roles of workers and their voices as thebest check on abuse;• establishing and confirming the existence of mechanisms
for providing independent, unannounced and thoroughlabour audits;• providing safe and effective ‘whistleblower’ and complaint
procedures;• providing clear guidelines for security procedures
throughout supply chains to ensure that security forces
are not used to intimidate, detain or abuse workers;• regularly updating shareholders and stakeholders on thecreation, maintenance and implementation of related
policies;• guaranteeing all workers freedom of movement by notallowing the confiscation of a worker’s official documents;• committing to provide restitution for victims and otherforms of remediation;• complying with trafficking-related local laws andinternational standards for confronting human trafficking
and protecting victims;• holding employees (managers, directors, etc.)
accountable for any violation or exploitative conduct
contributing to trafficking in persons.
3. Companies active in sectors and regions where there isa risk of trafficking and exploitation should undertake
careful risk assessments and consider training staff
to improve knowledge about the problem and aboutprocedures for identification and response.

49

How can I contribute as an individual?
• Be a socially responsible consumer. Consumers are
responsible for informing themselves about the brands
and items that are found on the market. It can be hard toknow where your food and clothes really come from andwhat processes have been involved in the making of theitems you buy. The shrimp you have for dinner might havebeen peeled by an exploited child; the t-shirt you wear
might contain colouring substances that are poisonous forworkers; and the trousers you wear might have been
sewn by a child toiling away in a sweatshop somewherein the GMS. Make sure that there is a Fairtrade mark on
packaging of the fish/seafood products you purchase:
this will tell you that the products are compliant withinternational standards for ethical consumerism.
• Be vigilant in your workplace an your community. Yourcarefulness could save someone from harmful exploitation.
• Share the information contained in this booklet with someone
you know who might be vulnerable to labour trafficking.
• Learn more about human labour trafficking, CSR andethical consumerism. The following websites provide
information on initiatives that work against trafficking andfor a decent and safe business environment: World Vision East Asia Regional Office:http://www.wvasiapacific.org/tag/Human-trafficking.html

 World Vision Australia, Don’t Trade Lives Campaign:
http://www.worldvision.com.au/OurWork/Solutions/
DontTradeLives.aspx
 Better Factories Cambodia http://www.betterfactories.org
 CSR Asia: http://www.csr-asia.com
 CSR360 Global Partner Network: http://csr360gpn.org
 End Human Trafficking Now! Campaign:
http://www.endhumantraffickingnow.com/Pages/
ArticlesList.aspx
 Ethical Consumer (online magazine):
http://www.ethicalconsumer.org/PrintMagazine.aspx
 Fair Trade Association of Australia & New Zealand
http://www.fairtrade.com.au
 United Nations Global Compact:
http://www.unglobalcompact.org
 US Department of Labor’s list of goods produced bychild labour or forced labour (2009)http://www.dol.gov/ilab/programs/ocft/pdf/2009tvpra.pdf
 Register on the CSR360 partner forum
http://csr360gpn.org/forum/ and exchange ideas, ask
questions and discuss how you can improve your life to
make ethically sound choices.
 Join the World Vision Australia Don’t Trade Lives
campaign: http://www.worldvision.com.au/OurWork/
Solutions/DontTradeLives.aspx

By taking small steps, everyone can make a difference!
50

Sokchan's mother working in the brick factory.
(Photo credit: Sopheak Kong/World Vision)51

What is World Vision
doing to combat
labour trafficking in
the GMS?
World Vision in the East Asia Region has been working tocombat trafficking in persons since the latter part of 1990s.
Currently, World Vision is implementing 13 national and two
regional projects in the six GMS countries: Cambodia, China,
Lao PDR, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam. The projects
mainly focus on prevention, risk or vulnerability reduction,
protection and policy advocacy.
In 2007 after a rigorous assessment and consultative process,World Vision initiated its second regional project entitled‘Regional Advocacy anti-Child Trafficking Programme(RACTP)’ in GMS countries. Currently, RACTP is being
implemented in all of the countries in the GMS. World Vision’s
main goal is to assist in the establishment of a positive andenabling policy environment to effectively combat trafficking
in persons, especially children, to reduce and ultimately
eliminate the problem in the GMS. The main strategy involves
developing regional infrastructures and mechanisms for sharing
information and learning, and developing appropriate strategies
for advocacy to influence the GMS governments.
52

In Myanmar, the Anti-Trafficking Taskforce and World Vision collaborated in
distributing information on safer migration.
(Photo credit: World Vision Myanmar)Glossary of legal terms
Human trafficking
Article 3 of the UN TIP Protocol5 defines trafficking inpersons as follows:(a) ‘Trafficking in Persons’ shall mean the recruitment,
transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of
persons, by means of the threat or use of force orother forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of
deception, of the abuse of power or of a position ofvulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments
or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having
control over another person, for the purpose of
exploitation. Exploitation shall include, at a minimum,
the exploitation of the prostitution of others or otherforms of sexual exploitation, forced labour or services,slavery or practices similar to slavery, servitude or theremoval of organs;(b) The consent of a victim of trafficking in persons to theintended exploitation set forth in subparagraph (a) of
this article shall be irrelevant where any of the means
set forth in subparagraph (a) have been used;(c) The recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or
receipt of a child for the purpose of exploitation shall beconsidered ‘trafficking in persons’ even if this does not
involve any of the means set forth in subparagraph (a) of
this article;(d) ‘Child’ shall mean any person under eighteen years ofage (Appendix 2).

Exploitation
Under the UN TIP Protocol, exploitation is defined toinclude several overlapping but potentially different kinds ofconduct, including forced labour or services, slavery or practices
similar to slavery, and servitude. These terms are particularly
relevant to our understanding of ‘labour trafficking’. The
Protocol does not provide definitions of these terms, so it
is necessary to look to other international legal instruments
to ascertain their precise meaning.*
Forced labour or services are defined as conditions inwhich the work or service is exacted under menace of penalty*The following has been directly cited from the Australian Institute of Criminology 2009.

53

and it is undertaken involuntarily (Convention Concerning
Forced or Compulsory Labour [ILO no. 29]: see also European
Convention on Human Rights, Article 4). According to the
ILO, ‘forced labour or services’ is not the same as situations
merely involving low wages or poor working conditions orlack of choice due to economic necessity. It represents asevere violation of human rights, and restriction of freedom(Report of the Director General 2005: 5).

Slavery
The term slavery has a long legal history. The central
feature of the international legal definition of slavery is theexercise of any or all of the powers attaching to the rightof ownership of a person (1929 Slavery Convention, Article
3; Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, Article
7(2)(c)). There are recent indications within internationallaw and practice that “the powers attaching to the right ofownership” can include many of the practices associatedwith trafficking – such as control of someone’s movement,
control of physical environment, psychological control,
measures taken to prevent or deter escape, force, threatof force or coercion, duration, assertion of exclusivity,
subjection to cruel treatment and abuse, control of sexuality,and forced labour. 35

54

Practices similar to slavery include debt bondage andserfdom, concepts that may be relevant to labour trafficking(Supplementary Convention on the Abolition of Slavery, the Slave
Trade, and Institutions and Practices Similar to Slavery 1956,
Article 1). In the 1956 Convention, these terms are defined
as follows:• Debt bondage is a condition that arises when aperson pledges his or her personal services (or theservices of a person under his control) as security fora debt, in circumstances in which either the value of
those services as reasonably assessed is not applied toreducing that debt, or the length and nature of thoseservices are not respectively limited and defined.
• Serfdom is the condition of a tenant who is, by law,custom, or other agreement, bound to live and labouron land belonging to another person and to renderservices to that person, whether for reward or not, incircumstances in which the tenant is not free to change
his or her status.
Practices similar to slavery include “the sale of children for
exploitation”. This is defined in the 1956 Convention as:“any institution or practice whereby a child or young person
under the age of 18 years, is delivered by either or both of
his natural parents or by his guardian to another person,
whether for reward or not, with a view to the exploitation.”(Supplementary Slavery Convention, Article 1(d))

55

In their local community centre, families in Myanmar viewawareness materials on how to prevent themselves and othersfrom becoming victims of trafficking.
(Photo credit: Khaing Khaing Nyein/World Vision)55

Useful websites
World Vision East Asia Regional Office
http://www.wvasiapacific.org/tag/Human-trafficking.html
World Vision Australia, Ethical Consumerism
http://www.worldvision.com.au/Issues/Human_
Trafficking___Slavery/WhatIsOurResponse/
Ethical_consumerism__Whats_behind_the_label_.aspx

Labour Protection Network
http://www.lpnrights.org
Taskforce on ASEAN Migrant Workers:
Migrant Workers Connection
http://www.workersconnection.org

World Vision Australia, Shop Ethically
http://www.worldvision.com.au/Act/ShopEthically.
aspx?cmsid=b3989d8b-c4f3-4c73-b60f-cb9f7ca43b91

ILO Multilateral Framework on Labour Migration(This is a global framework of non-binding principles,
guidelines and good practices on labour migration)
http://www.ilo.org/public/english/protection/migrant/
download/multilat_fwk_en.pdf

World Vision Australia, Don’t Trade Lives
Campaign
http://www.worldvision.com.au/OurWork/Solutions/
DontTradeLives.aspx

United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime –Human Trafficking
http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/human-trafficking/index.
html?ref=menuside

Better Factories Cambodia
http://www.betterfactories.org
End Human Trafficking Now!
http://www.endhumantraffickingnow.com

56

Global Initiative to Fight Human Trafficking
http://www.ungift.org

Children in northern Thailand play at a day school where U.S.
Government funding helps protect girls at risk of being trafficked.
(Photo credit: Kay Chernush for the U.S. Department of State)

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References

58

1.

U.S. Department of State. Trafficking in Persons Report 2010 (Washington D.C., 2010). http://www.state.gov/g/tip/rls/tiprpt/2010/index.htm, accessed 30 September 2010. For more information on statistical estimates and methodologies used in reports on
trafficking, see: Gallagher, A. The International Law of Human Trafficking, Cambridge University Press, 2010. http://works.bepress.
com/anne_gallagher/12, accessed 30 September 2010.

2.

Gallagher A. and Pearson E. ‘The high cost of freedom: A legal and policy analysis of shelter detention for victims of trafficking’,
Human Rights Quarterly, 32.1: 73-114, 2010. http://works.bepress.com/anne_gallagher/11, accessed 30 September 2010.

3.

Molland S. ‘The perfect business? Traffickers, victims and anti-traffickers along the Mekong’, PhD thesis, Macquarie University(Sydney, 2008). http://www.mendeley.com/research/the-perfect-business-traffickers-victims-and-antitraffickers-along-the-mekong-1,
accessed 30 September 2010.

4.

Council for Security Cooperation in the Asia Pacific (CSCAP). Report on the CSCAP Study Group on Human Trafficking, Discovery
Suites (Pasig City, The Philippines, April 2005).

5.

United Nations Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, Supplementing
the United Nations Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime (2000, entered into force 2003), http://www.unodc.org/
documents/treaties/UNTOC/Publications/TOC%20Convention/TOCebook-e.pdf. For an excellent in-depth and up-to-date analysisof the Protocol, see: Gallagher, A. The International Law of Human Trafficking, 2010.

6.

Australian Institute of Criminology. Labour trafficking: Key concepts and issues: Transnational Crime Brief No. 3(Canberra: March 2009), http://www.aic.gov.au/en/publications/current%20series/tcb/1-20/tcb003.aspx

7.

Royal Danish Embassy. Sector Overview: The Fishery Industry in Thailand (Bangkok, 2007). http://www.ambbangkok.um.dk/NR/
rdonlyres/5CE2A89A-6708-43E0-90BD-37F924C3C71B/0/SectorOverviewFisheryIndustryinThailandApril2007.pdf, accessed 30
September 2010.

8.

For example, see: Law on Suppression of Human Trafficking and Sexual Exploitation, Kingdom of Cambodia (2008).
http://www.no-trafficking.org/content/Laws_Agreement/cambodia%20new%20law%20on%20trafficking%20&%20sexual%20
exploitation%20-%20english.pdf. Also the Anti-Trafficking in Persons Act, Royal Thai Government, B. E. 2551, 2008. http://www.
no-trafficking.org/content/Laws_Agreement/laws_agreement_pdf/trafficking_in_persons_act_b.e%202551%20%28eng.%29.pdf

9.

Robertson Philip S, Jr. Migration and trafficking: Trafficking into the fishing industry in Thailand 2009. Unpublished paper presented
to World Vision Trafficking Working Group meeting (Bangkok, November 2009).

10. Sokchea, M and O’Toole, J. ‘Trafficked fishermen jump ship’, The Phnom Penh Post (5 February 2010).
11. Seiff, A. and Vannarin, N. ‘Fishermen escape Thai boat, seek return from East Timor’, The Cambodia Daily (5 February 2010).
12. United Nations Inter-Agency Project on Human Trafficking. SIREN case analysis (Bangkok, April 2009).
13. See http://news.asiaone.com/News/Latest%2BNews/Asia/Story/A1Story20100604-220149.html and http://www.licadho-cambodia.
org/articles/20100111/107/index.html; and http://www.voanews.com/khmer-english/news/cambodia/Young-Cambodian-Men-at-Riskof-Being-Trafficked-and-Sold-Into-Labor-93402399.html
14. Lee, CC. A Study into Exploitative Labour Brokerage Practices in Cambodia 2007, Coordinated Mekong Ministerial Initiative against
Trafficking (COMMIT), study commissioned by UNIAP Cambodia (2007).
15. Kunmakara, M. ‘Cambodian labourers flock to Malaysian jobs’, The Phnom Penh Post (9 April 2010). http://www.phnompenhpost.
com/index.php/2010040937225/Business/cambodian-labourers-flock-to-malaysian-jobs.html, accessed 30 September.
16. International Labour Organization, International Labour Standards on Migrant Workers’ Rights: Guide for Policymakers andPractitioners in Asia and the Pacific (Bangkok, 2007).
17. Keo C. ‘Legally enslaved? Cambodian workers abroad talk about their experience’, unpublished paper for World Vision
Cambodia (2010).
18. International Labour Organization. International labour migration: A rights-based approach (Geneva, 2010).
19. Sciortino, R. and Punpuing, S. International Migration in Thailand 2009, International Organization for Migration (Bangkok, 2009).
http://bkkintra.iom-seasia.org/resource/internationalmigration2009/IOMThailandreportEngresize.pdf, accessed 30 September 2010.

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20. International Labour Organization. Accelerating Action Against Child Labour: Global Report Under the Follow-up to the ILO
Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work. Report to the International Labour Conference, 99th Session,
Geneva, 2010.
21. UNICEF. Reversing the Trend: Child Trafficking in East and South-East Asia (Bangkok, 2009).
22. ‘Growing pain of child labor in Vietnam’, compiled by Hong Nguyen. http://www.vietnewsonline.vn/News/Features/9010/Growingpain-of-child-labor-in-Vietnam.htm, accessed 30 September 2010.
23. International Labour Organization. ‘We’re in business! From Better Factories to Better Work’, 2008. http://www.ilo.org/wow/
Articles/lang--en/WCMS_094381/index.htm, accessed 30 September 2010.
24. International Labour Organization. Decent Work for Domestic Workers. Report IV(1) to International Labour Conference, 99th
Session, Geneva, 2010.
25. International Labour Organization. ‘Female migrant workers in the labour market: Global challenges and trends’ in ILO Gender News,International Women’s Day, 8th March 2007 – Special Issue on Women and Migration, cited in International Labour Standards on
Migrant Workers’ Rights: Guide for Policymakers and Practitioners in Asia and the Pacific (Bangkok, 2007), page 16, http://www.ilo.
org/public/libdoc/ilo/2007/107B09_314_engl.pdf, accessed 30 September 2010.
26. ‘Southeast Asia’, Migration News, Volume 17, No. 2 (April 2010). http://migration.ucdavis.edu/mn/more.php?id=3600_0_3_0,
accessed 30 September 2010.
27. Human Rights Watch. From the Tiger to the Crocodile: Abuse of Migrant Workers in Thailand (Bangkok, 2010). http://www.hrw.
org/en/reports/2010/02/23/tiger-crocodile-0, accessed 30 September.
28. Cropley, E. ‘In Thai shrimp industry, child labor and rights abuses persist’, New York Times (25 April, 2007). http://www.nytimes.
com/2007/04/25/business/worldbusiness/25iht-baht.4.5438244.html, accessed 30 September.
29. The Labor Rights Promotion Network in Cropley, E., ‘In Thai shrimp industry, child labor and rights abuses persist’, New York Times(25 April 2007).
30. For more information about trafficking and the seafood industry, see: Solidarity Center. The Degradation of Work: The True Costof Shrimp, Solidarity Center (Washington D.C., 2008). http://www.solidaritycenter.org/files/pubs_True_Cost_of_Shrimp.pdf. Also
http://www.humantrafficking.org/updates/616) and Cropley, 2007.

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31. International Labour Organization. The Mekong Challenge - an Honest Broker: Improving cross-border recruitment practices forthe benefit of Government, Workers and Employers (Bangkok, 2008). http://www.ilo.org/asia/whatwedo/publications/lang--en/
docName--WCMS_099808/index.htm, accessed 30 September.
32. Sakaew S. and Tangprapakoon P. ‘Brokers and Labor Migration from Myanmar: A case study from Samut Sakorn’, Labour Rights
Protection Network, Asian Research Center for Migration and Chulalongkorn University Social Research Institute, August 2009.
33. United Nations Inter-Agency Project on Human Trafficking. SIREN Field Report (Bangkok, June 2007). http://www.no-trafficking.
org/content/SIREN/SIREN_pdf/SIREN%20TH-01%20Samut%20Sakhon%20brokers%20and%20traffickers.pdf, accessed 30
September.
34. International Organization for Migration. Global Eye on Human Trafficking, Issue 1 (Geneva, December 2007). http://www.iom.int/jahia/
webdav/site/myjahiasite/shared/shared/mainsite/projects/showcase_pdf/global_eye_first_issue.pdf, accessed 30 September 2010.
35. Prosecutor v. Kunarac, Kovac & Vukovic, Case No. IT-96-23-T, Judgment (22 February 2001), paragraphs 542 & 543. See further:
Gallagher, A. The International Law of Human Trafficking, 2010.

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World Vision contacts:
World Vision East Asia Regional Office
Bangkok Business Centre, 13th Floor,
29 Sukhumvit 63 (Ekamai Road), Klongton Nua, Wattana, Bangkok, Thailand
Office: +66 2 391 6155
Fax: +66 2 381 1976
www.wvasiapacific.org
East Asia Regional Office
Laurence Gray, laurence_gray@wvi.org
Abid Gulzar, abid_gulzar@wvi.org
John Whan Yoon, JohnWYoon@wvi.org
Cambodia
Veth Vorn, veth_vorn@wvi.org
Lao PDR
Sourivonexay Phrommala, sourivonexay_phrommala@wvi.org
MyanmarAye Aye, aye_aye@wvi.org
Thailand
Wandee Krichanan, wandee_krichanan@wvi.org
VietnamKhong Huong Lan, khong_huong_lan@wvi.org

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