Burma

There are 3 million Burmese workers living in Thailand. The MAP Foundation exists to support and empower them in the face of degradation and abuse.

The Karen Human Rights Group's report Abuse, Poverty and Migration: Investigating migrants' motivations to leave home in Burma is available to download free.

International reporting of the large-scale migration of those leaving Burma in search of work abroad has highlighted the perils for migrant during travel and in host countries. However, there has been a lack of research in the root causes of this migration. Identifying the root causes of migration has important implications for the assistance and protection of these migrants. Drawing on over 150 interviews with villagers in rural Burma and those from Burma who have sought employment abroad, this report identifies the exploitative abuse underpinning poverty and livelihoods vulnerability in Burma which, in turn, are major factors motivating individuals to leave home and seek work abroad.

"[T]he majority of the people in my village have come to work in Thailand. They don't want to stay in their village because they're afraid that they'll have to do forced labour."
Ko M (male, 30), T*** village, Dooplaya District, Karen State (Feb 2009)

Strike at a shoe factory in Rangoon over wages.

Workers are involved in a sit-in at the Taiyi shoe factory in Hlaing Tharyar Industrial Zone, about 11 km from downtown Rangoon. Riot Police have been stationed nearby.

Demands included the right to paid national holidays, the right to medical leave, and the right to obtain temporary passports and work permits, as well as for the installation of CCTV cameras in the workplace so hours of work could be properly recorded.

Thousands of garment workers have recently held protests about pay and conitions in Rangoon, Burma.

"On 10th February hundreds of armed police were told to monitor closely a protest by some 2000 female factory workers in the capital Ragoon demanding a pay rise and better workplace conditions."

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