Through generous funding by the United States Department of State’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor (DRL), Verité is continuing to support workers navigating risks in new labor markets between Uttar Pradesh, India and the Gulf States. This project focuses on building capacities of partners to provide guidance to workers during the recruitment process in Uttar Pradesh, and to safely navigate systems for addressing any exploitation they may encounter during employment in the Gulf.
Labor issues are complex and deeply entrenched in recruitment malpractices. Many migrant workers are forced to pay excessive recruitment fees that keep them in debt, effectively placing them in situations of forced labor and exploitive working conditions. Last...
Despite the growing awareness of, and commitments to, ethical recruitment, an analysis of CUMULUS data from early 2019 to the present reveals that less than five percent of employers fully absorb the true cost of cross border recruitment, including all recruitment fees and related costs. Instead, those costs continue to be passed on to foreign migrant workers.