Bangladesh to speak for Asian migrants

Bangladesh wants the Asian labour exporting countries to have a common stance on migrant workers' rights, including a minimum wage ceiling and a reduced cost of migration to the countries, mainly in the Gulf region and Southeast Asia.
Contemplating a concept like this, the government has planned to hold bilateral meetings with the ten other labour exporting Asian countries, said Minister for Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment Khandker Mosharraf Hossain.
The initiative comes ahead of a meeting of the Colombo Process, an alliance of 11 Asian labour exporters, which launched its journey in 2003. Bangladesh, the chair of the group, will host the fourth ministerial in Dhaka in April 2011. Its theme is "Migration with Dignity".
Afghanistan, Bangladesh, China, India, Indonesia, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Vietnam are the members of the Colombo Process. Nine labour importers -- Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Yemen, Malaysia and Singapore -- will be invited as observers.
The process aims at facilitating dialogues among the member states and the labour importing countries to strengthen migration management both in the Asian region and in the labour markets, according to the alliance website.
Khandker Mosharraf Hossain, present chair of the process, has planned to meet some of the member countries on the sidelines of Global Forum on Migration and Development (GFMD) to be held in Mexico in November.
If it is not possible to hold a bilateral meeting with any member country in Mexico, the minister will visit those countries and try to reach a consensus on the issues crucial to ensuring rights of the migrants, the minister said.
"We found our workers bearing exorbitant costs to go abroad for jobs. In the bilateral meetings, we will discuss how the costs can be reduced. We will also see if we can set a minimum wage ceiling for the Asian migrants," Mosharraf Hossain said.
"We will learn from each other and then try to have a common stance on certain issues necessary to protect our workers' rights abroad."
An estimated 70 lakh Bangladeshis now work abroad, and most of them are in the Middle East, Malaysia and Singapore. They send home over $10 billion a year, which remains a vital source of income for the country.
According to estimates, more than 2.5 million Asian workers leave their countries every year under contracts to work abroad.
In the case of Bangladesh, high cost of migration, which ranges from Tk 2 to Tk 5 lakh for each person, is a major concern, as many of the workers selling their labour for low wages fail to recover what they spend for going abroad, experts said.
Also, cases of unemployment or non-payment of wages at times create tension among the workers abroad, they said.
Bangladesh will also suggest that the foreign employers pay salaries to the migrants regularly and through banks to make sure that there is no dispute over wages and, if any, may be settled on the basis of banking documents, said Ashadul Islam, joint secretary of the expatriates' welfare ministry.
Paying wages through banks is mandatory in the United Arab Emirates, he said, adding that this practice can be replicated in other countries.
"We will also try to build consensus on migrants' health and work environment," Islam said.