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3 From Policy Research to Policy Impact
1. From Policy Research to Policy Impact
Migration, Knowledge Production and Regional
Integration in the Context of South Asia
Bandita Sijapati
Research Director
Centre for the Study of Labour and Mobility (CESLAM)
Social Science Baha, Kathmandu, Nepal
16 March 2016
5. Labour Permits by Destination
Source: Department of Foreign Employment
24.4%
40.6%
16.5%
10.4%
3.7%
4.5%
Qatar Malaysia
Saudi Arabia U A E
Kuwait Others
0
50000
100000
150000
200000
250000
2001
2003
2005
2007
2009
2011
2013
2015
Kuwait Malaysia
Qatar Saudi Arabia
UAE
7. Important Driver of
Poverty Reduction
42 %
31 %
25 %
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
Year 1995/96 Year 2003/04 Year 2010/11
8. The Promise of Remittances…
78.9
7.1
4.5
3.5
2.4
Daily consumption
Repay loans
Household property
Education
Capital formation Make migration/remittances
beneficial to individuals
Maximize the value of
remittances
- Lower cost of remitting
-Lower the cost of migration
Provide productive investment
opportunities
9. Cost of remitting decreasing…
4% 6% 4%
73%
9% 4%
Brought himself/herself
Through friends,
relatives
Through hundi
Through money transfer
companies
Transfer to own bank
account
Transfer to other’s bank
account
Source: NMS 2009 as illustrated in World Bank, Large-Scale Migration and Remittance in Nepal, 2011
10. High cost of migration …
The Debt Trap
7.00%
1.90%
2.70%
2.50%
25.70%
6.80%
53.30%
Own Savings
Sale of Assets
Help from family members in Nepal
Help from family members abroad
Loan from friends, relatives
Bank loan
Loan from village merchants, etc.
0.00%
10.00%
20.00%
30.00%
40.00%
50.00%
60.00%
Source: NMS 2009 as illustrated in World Bank, Large-Scale Migration and Remittance in Nepal, 2011
11. Social Impacts of Migration
• Total fertility rate decreased
• Household responsibilities and decision-making transferred to
women
• Nuclear family: role of decision-making increased
• Extended family: no remarkable change
• Breakdown in familial ties/relationships/broken families
• Decrease in social protection for elderly
• HIV problems increased (for India)
• Suicide leading cause of death amongst women of
reproductive age
12. Abuses Experienced by Workers
• On an average, 3 dead bodies per day (primarily from Saudi
Arabia and Malaysia) and the number of cases of injuries
• Cases Reported
– Fraudulence by agents/manpower agencies
– Contractual irregularities
– Non-payment or irregular payment of salaries
– Stranded in destination countries
– Physical and sexual abuses
– Forgery cases (e.g., fake documents, trafficking, etc)
– Seizure of documents
– Arrest in destination countries
15. Preparing for 18th SAARC Agenda
• South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation
(SAARC)
– 8 member states; Established in 1983; 1st Summit in 1985
– 18th SAARC Summit, 2015: reinvigorate regional cooperation,
deepen regional integration, and fulfill developmental
aspirations of people of South Asia
– Regional cooperation on migration
• Interested parties
– Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka
– But major players (India, Pakistan) not keen
– Nepal heading the secretariat
www.ceslam.org
16. Preparing for 18th SAARC Agenda
• Roundtable discussion
organized by the Foreign
Employment Promotion
Board to discuss a draft
note
– Draft note driven by
international normative
frameworks (i.e.,
Migrant Convention,
ILO Convention)
– Experience of CESLAM
on regional migration
issues shared
• Importance of labour migration to all (UP,
Bihar)
• Opportunity for development
• Collective emergency response (e.g., Libya)
• ASEAN Declaration on labour migration
• SAARC Convention on Preventing and
Combating Trafficking of Women and
Children for Prostitution, 2002
Opportunities
• Intra-regional tensions, particularly due to
legacies of 1947 partition of India-Pakistan
• Low-skilled migrant sending countries
versus high-skilled migrant sending
countries versus labour-receiving countries
• Convincing the major players versus agenda
of the smaller countries
Challenges
17. Drafting the Agenda
• Representative from Ministry of Foreign Affairs
• Representative from Ministry of Labour & Employment
• Migration Expert
• Civil Society Organization
Technical Working Group
• Recognition of labour migration as area of common interest
• Optimize benefits of migration for both sending & receiving countries (reduce
remittance transfer costs, recruitment fees, productive investments)
• Expand scope of trafficking
• Collaboration on management (minimum standards, skills qualifications,
mutual legal assistance, and emergency response mechanisms)
Key Agenda Items
• Widening ownership
• Government, civil society and international organizations
Actors/Institutions
18. Policy Impact and Way Forward
18th SAARC
Declaration
• Collaborate and cooperate on safe, orderly and responsible
management of migration from South Asia to ensure safety,
security & wellbeing of their migrant workers in the
destination countries outside the region
Framing an
Action Plan
• Set up an institutional mechanism to facilitate collaboration &
cooperation on management of key labour migration issues
• Formulate ‘SAARC Declaration on the Protection and
Promotion of the Rights and Welfare of Migrant Workers’
Future
Directions
• Scheduled meeting of representatives from labour and foreign
affairs ministries (May 2016) to finalize action plan
19. To Conclude… Lessons Learnt
• History of engagement with policy makers
• Clear understanding of contextual factors
• Partnerships with stakeholders
• Seeking entry points for impacts and
leveraging them
• Realistic expectations on impacts
www.ceslam.org
The number of absentee population has increasing over the years and between 2001 and 2011 itself, there was more than two-fold increase in the number of Nepalis who were absent.
According to the NLSS, 53 percent of the households have at least one absentee living currently within or outside the country.
This amounts to 7.24% of Nepal’s total population is currently absent.
The number of labour permits issued increased by more than a hundred-fold in the 18 years for which there are records—from 3605 permits in 1993/94 to 453,543 in 2012/13.
There have been some exceptions when either a surge or decrease in the issuance of labour permit was observed.
As highlighted by the two circles, there was a sharp increase in 1998/99 and 2001/02, which could have resulted from the dearth of employment opportunities and growing insecurity in the country, both by-products of the socio-political unrest that engulfed Nepal during the period. But also, the surge in the late 1990s could be attributed to the change in policy regulations which made migration more easy.
On the other hand, in 2008/09, the number of individuals going abroad for employment decreased, particularly because Malaysia, the biggest importer of Nepali labourers at the time tightened its immigration policies to restrict ‘irregular’ and ‘illegal’ migration. T
his period also coincided with the onset of the global financial crisis, which affected labour recruitment and migration practices of the Malaysian government who started giving greater priority to its citizens than to migrants in hiring practices.
Because Malaysia has been a top-ranked destination for many Nepali workers, a sudden decrease in the demand for workers in there also meant an overall decrease in Nepalis seeking foreign employment in 2008/2009.