ABU DHABI DIALOGUES ON PROTECTION OF WORKER RIGHTS PRODUCE AGREEMENT—BUT it’s just a start!
By Kevin A. Stoda
This week in Abu Dhabi 20 nations met to discuss ways to improve labor protections for the great number of foreign workers in the UAE and other neighboring countries. These countries were Afghanistan, Bahrain, Bangladesh, China, India, Indonesia, Kuwait, Malaysia, Nepal, Oman, Pakistan, the Philippines, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand, United Arab Emirates, Vietnam and Yemen.
The agreement is an initial step in a long journey to improve the rights and legal system in the Gulf region, specifically in the area of protecting laborers from Asia, especially those from South Asia.
Here are the main facets of the new agreement. They focus on creating a strong partnership among the twenty states involved:
(1) Enhance knowledge in the areas of the labor market trends, skills profiles, temporary contractual laborers and remittance policies and flows anther interplay with development in the region.
(2) Build capacity for effective matching of labor demand and supply.
(3) Prevent illegal recruitment practices and promoting welfare and protection measures for contractual workers, supportive of their well being and preventing their exploitation at origin and destination.
(4) Developing a framework for a comprehensive approach to managing the entire cycle of temporary contractual mobility that foster the mutual interests of countries and destination of the laborers.
Inside the 6 Gulf Cooperation Council member states attending this Abu Dhabi Dialogue—i.e. Oman, the UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain—are approximately 12 to 15 million foreign laborers. Many of these are from South Asia or Southeast Asia.
The IOM (International Organization of Immigration) was very involved in overseeing the conference. The Director-General of the IOM, Brunson McKinley, stated that he was pleased with the results: “The biggest challenge was to synthesize the points of views of more than 20 countries, rich and poor, small and big. However, the Abu Dhabi Dialogue has been successful so far.”
McKinley added that already by “2005, some 191 million people across the world were living – and often working – in countries other than those of their birth. This figure has more than doubled since 1965, a pace of increase that is well in excess of the global population growth rate over the same period.”
In Business Intelligence Middle East, Ahmed Mousa wrote: “The potential of temporary contractual labour mobility in fostering development is not a new concept in Asia. For a number of decades now, many Asian countries have looked to opportunities available in the regional labour market to satisfy their employment and human resource needs. However, what is new today is the recognition that we are living in a world that is more mobile than ever before; a world with greater integration of economies, labour forces and societies; and one which is experiencing rapid and deep changes, notably due to technological advances, demographic shifts and environmental degradation.”
Just 4 weeks earlier, the GCC states had opened the first large Arab Common market for their own citizens as laborers and business persons—permitting all citizens to move, work and live freely among the 6 member states. It is hoped that other workers will eventually be given such similar rights through the Abu Dhabi Dialogue Process, but with the recent history of the GCC states having ignored enforcement of their own labor laws time and again, steps are not likely to be implemented or put into practice as soon as one might hope.
One final footnote: One of the participants at the conference, the Philippines government, this very same week prohibited its nationals to work in Jordan after a series of clashes over labor rights and protections there in recent months. Jordan was not a signatory or participant at the Dialogues in the UAE—neither were countries like Iraq, Iran or Israel.
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