Humanitarian Organization for Migration Economics

Last updated
Humanitarian Organization for Migration Economics
AbbreviationHOME
Founder Bridget Tan
Location
President of the Board
Natalia Goh
Executive Director
Jolovan Wham
AffiliationsYayasan Dunia Viva Wanita (Sister organization)
Website home.org.sg

Humanitarian Organization for Migration Economics (HOME) is a Singaporean non-governmental organization that provides services to, and advocates on behalf of, migrant workers. It was founded in 2004 by Bridget Tan.

Contents

Founding

The Humanitarian Organization for Migration Economics was founded by Bridget Tan in September 2004. Tan had previously co-founded and led the Roman Catholic Archdiocesan Commission for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People (ACMI), but left that organization due to a lack of support from the Church. Tan used $60,000 from her retirement funds to launch HOME.

Activities

The organization provides temporary room and board, medical, legal, and financial assistance, and job skills training to migrant workers that have been financially, emotionally, or sexually abused by their employers or by the agents that recruit migrant workers. HOME also operates a telephone help line and a weekly help desk. Since its founding, the organization has expanded its focus, and now also works to support victims of the sex trade and to combat human trafficking. [1] [2] [3]

In addition to directly serving migrant workers, the organization also works with Singaporean government agencies to help shape policy on migrant workers, sex workers, and human trafficking. HOME holds regular meetings with the Singaporean government's Ministry of Manpower, [3] and also advocates for policy changes publicly. HOME advocates for migrant workers to have regularly scheduled time off, [1] better pay, and equal pay for migrants from different countries. [4] In 2012, it joined with five other non-governmental organizations to criticize an anti-trafficking bill being discussed in Parliament for being too heavily focused on prevention and not focused enough on protecting migrant worker rights, as well as for focusing overly on women trafficked for the sex trade, to the detriment of other victims of trafficking. [5] Home also publishes editorials through the website The Online Citizen . [6]

Humanitarian Organization for Migration Economics conducts research on issues that affect the people it serves. In 2012, HOME collaborated with Yayasan Lintas Nusa and Yayasan Dunia Viva Wanita, the latter a women's shelter in Batam, Indonesia that was also founded by Bridget Tan, on a survey of Indonesian sex workers. The survey found evidence of inconsistent condom use and a significant number of sex tourists from Singapore. [7] In 2015, HOME released a study that found that migrant workers had a significantly higher risk of mental health problems, and recommended better rest, nutrition, and social conditions to help curb the risk. [8] [9]

Recognition

In 2010, HOME was selected by the Asia Society as the recipient of the Asia Society-Bank of America Merrill Lynch Asia 21 Young Leaders Public Service Award. [2] Bridget Tan has also been personally recognized for the work that she did as part of HOME, and received a Hero Acting to End Modern-Day Slavery Award from then United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at a June 2011 ceremony surrounding the release of the Department of State's 2011 Trafficking in Persons Report. [10]

Collaborations

HOME has worked with local artists to create awareness and source aid through crowd funding. In 2017 they worked with international artist Nicola Anthony to raise awareness about migrant workers who needed public help to crowd fund for the cost of their medical bills. Nicola Anthony created three artworks which were exhibited at Singapore Art Museum, telling the stories of three exploited migrant workers. As a result, HOME were able to collect $5000 to cover one year's medical expenses for Mr Wang, (who was repatriated to his home country after suffering a work-related stroke).

Related Research Articles

International Organization for Migration Intergovernmental organization

The International Organization for Migration (IOM) is a United Nations agency that provides services and advice concerning migration to governments and migrants, including internally displaced persons, refugees, and migrant workers.

Migrant worker Person who migrates to pursue work

A migrant worker is a person who migrates within a home country or outside it to pursue work. Migrant workers usually do not have the intention to stay permanently in the country or region in which they work.

Sex trafficking Trade of sexual slaves

Sex trafficking is human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation. It has been called a form of modern slavery because of the way victims are forced into sexual acts, usually non-consensually, in a form of sexual slavery. Perpetrators of the crime are called sex traffickers or pimps—people who manipulate victims to engage in various forms of commercial sex with paying customers. Sex traffickers use force, fraud, and coercion as they recruit, transport, and provide their victims as prostitutes. Sometimes victims are brought into a situation of dependency on their trafficker(s), financially or emotionally. Every aspect of sex trafficking is considered a crime, from acquisition to transportation and exploitation of victims. This includes any sexual exploitation of adults or minors, including child sex tourism (CST) and domestic minor sex trafficking (DMST).

Eunice Olsen

Eunice Elizabeth Olsen is a Singaporean actress, host, communications trainer, producer and business woman. She is a former Nominated Member of Parliament (NMP) in Singapore for two terms, a speaker, and an advocate for women's empowerment.

Migrant domestic workers are, according to the International Labour Organization’s Convention No. 189 and the International Organization for Migration, any persons "moving to another country or region to better their material or social conditions and improve the prospect for themselves or their family," engaged in a work relationship performing "in or for a household or households." Domestic work itself can cover a "wide range of tasks and services that vary from country to country and that can be different depending on the age, gender, ethnic background and migration status of the workers concerned." These particular workers have been identified by some academics as situated within "the rapid growth of paid domestic labor, the feminization of transnational migration, and the development of new public spheres." Prominent discussions on the topic include the status of these workers, reasons behind the pursue in this labour, recruitment and employment practices in the field, and various measures being undertaken to change the conditions of domestic work among migrants.

Immigration to Singapore is the process by which people migrate to Singapore for the purpose of residing there—and where a majority go on to become permanent residents and Singaporean citizens.

Filipinos in Singapore consists of citizens of the Philippines residing in Singapore or Singaporeans of Filipino descent. According to a 2013 estimate by the Commission on Filipinos Overseas, a total of 203,243 Filipinos live or reside in the country, with 44,102 permanent residents or persons of Filipino descent who are not citizens of the Philippines within the community.

According to the U.S. Government's Trafficking in Person's (TIP) Report, Singapore is a destination country for foreign victims trafficked for the purpose of labor and commercial sexual exploitation. Over the years, victims of trafficking in Singapore have come from many countries throughout Asia such as India, Thailand, the People’s Republic of China, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, the Philippines, Cambodia, Vietnam, Burma and Malaysia. Many of these people travel to Singapore voluntarily for work in different industries such as construction, manufacturing, or commercial sex. The use of deception about working conditions, debt bondage, the unlawful confiscation of travel documents, confinement and/or physical or sexual abuse is utilized by traffickers to force victims into involuntary servitude. The U.S. TIP Report also notes a small quantity of Singaporeans engaging in and/or promoting child sex tourism abroad. The U.S. State Department's Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons placed the country in Tier 1 in 2020.

According to the United States Department of State, "Thailand is a source, destination, and transit country for men, women, and children subjected to forced labour and sex trafficking." Thailand's relative prosperity attracts migrants from neighboring countries who flee conditions of poverty and, in the case of Burma, military repression. Significant illegal migration to Thailand presents traffickers with opportunities to coerce or defraud undocumented migrants into involuntary servitude or sexual exploitation.

Human trafficking Trade of humans for the purpose of forced labor, sexual slavery, or commercial sexual exploitation

Human trafficking is the trade of humans for the purpose of forced labour, sexual slavery, or commercial sexual exploitation for the trafficker or others. This may encompass providing a spouse in the context of forced marriage, or the extraction of organs or tissues, including for surrogacy and ova removal. Human trafficking can occur within a country or trans-nationally. Human trafficking is a crime against the person because of the violation of the victim's rights of movement through coercion and because of their commercial exploitation. Human trafficking is the trade in people, especially women and children, and does not necessarily involve the movement of the person from one place to another.

Indonesia is a source, transit, and destination country for women, children, and men trafficked for the purposes of commercial sexual exploitation and forced labor. The greatest threat of trafficking facing Indonesian men and women is that posed by conditions of forced labor and debt bondage in more developed Asian countries and the Middle East.

Human trafficking in Australia

Human trafficking in Australia is illegal under Divisions 270 and 271 of the Criminal Code (Cth). In September 2005, Australia ratified the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, especially Women and Children, which supplemented the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime. Amendments to the Criminal Code were made in 2005 to implement the Protocol.

Polaris is a nonprofit non-governmental organization that works to combat and prevent sex and labor trafficking in North America. The organization's 10-year strategy is built around the understanding that human trafficking does not happen in vacuum but rather is the predictable end result of a range of other persistent injustices and inequities in our society and our economy. Knowing that, and leveraging data available from more than a dozen years operating the U.S. National Human Trafficking Hotline, Polaris is focused on three major areas of work: building power for migrant workers who are at risk of trafficking in U.S. agricultural and other industries; leveraging the reach and expertise of financial systems to disrupt trafficking, creating accountability for perpetrators of violence against people in the sex trade and expanding services and supports to vulnerable people to prevent trafficking before it happens.

Women migrant workers from developing countries engage in paid employment in countries where they are not citizens. While women have traditionally been considered companions to their husbands in the migratory process, most adult migrant women today are employed in their own right. In 2017, of the 168 million migrant workers, over 68 million were women. The increase in proportion of women migrant workers since the early twentieth century is often referred to as the "feminization of migration".

Migrant sex work is sex work done by migrant workers. It is significant because of its role as a dominant demographic of sex work internationally. It has common features across various contexts, such as migration from rural to urban areas and from developing to industrialized nations, and the economic factors that help to determine migrant status. Migrant sex workers have also been the subject of discussions concerning the legality of sex work, its connection to sex trafficking, and the views of national governments and non-governmental organizations about the regulation of sex work and the provision of services for victims of sex trafficking.

Human trafficking in Southeast Asia

Human trafficking in Southeast Asia has long been a problem for the area and is still prevalent today. It has been observed that as economies continue to grow, the demand for labor is at an all-time high in the industrial sector and the sex tourism sector. A mix of impoverished individuals and the desire for more wealth creates an environment for human traffickers to benefit in the Southeast Asia region. Many nations within the region have taken preventive measures to end human trafficking within their borders and punish traffickers operating there.

Bridget Tan Singaporean activist (1948–2022)

Bridget Lew Tan was a Singaporean migrant workers' rights advocate and the founder of the Humanitarian Organization for Migration Economics (HOME). After retiring from a career in the private sector, Tan began volunteering with the Archdiocesan Commission for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People (ACMI), which she chaired. She left ACMI after it declined to support some of Tan's initiatives, and in 2004 she founded HOME, which provides services for and advocates on behalf of migrant workers. That same year she founded a sister organization in Indonesia, Yayasan Dunia Viva Wanita. For her work, Tan was honored by the Asia Society, the United States Department of State, and the governments of Thailand and The Philippines.

Sex trafficking in Taiwan

Sex trafficking in Taiwan is human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation and slavery that occurs in the Republic of China. Taiwan is a country of origin, destination, and transit for sexually trafficked persons.

Almost half of international migrants are women, generally travelling as either migrant workers or refugees. Women migrant workers migrate from developing countries to high-income countries to engage in paid employment, typically in gendered professions such as domestic work. Because their work disproportionately takes place in private homes, they are vulnerable to exploitation and abuse. Wages earned are largely sent home to the originating country to support the cost of living of the family left behind.

Chinese nationals in Singapore refers to Chinese people who are of Chinese nationality residing in Singapore. According to the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, the community had a population of 451,481 in 2019, with 52,516 originating from Hong Kong and 18,820 from Macau, the 2 special administrative regions of China. The community of Chinese nationals are the 2nd largest foreign community in Singapore, constituting 18% of the country's foreign-born population.

References

  1. 1 2 Ho, Olivia (7 December 2014). "Migrant worker activist Bridget Tan makes first public appearance here after stroke". The Straits Times. Singapore Press Holdings Ltd. Retrieved 3 January 2016.
  2. 1 2 "Asia Society Announces the 2010 Public Service Award Winner". Asia Society . 11 January 2011. Retrieved 3 January 2016.
  3. 1 2 "Singapore". HumanTrafficking.org. Academy for Educational Development. Archived from the original on 19 March 2016. Retrieved 3 January 2016.
  4. ↑ "Consider migrant workers in wage guidelines: HOME". Today . Mediacorp Press Ltd. 1 May 2015. Retrieved 3 January 2016.
  5. ↑ Philomin, Laura (21 October 2014). "Prevention of Human Trafficking Bill lacks focus on protecting victims' rights: NGOs". Today. Mediacorp Press Ltd. Retrieved 3 January 2016.
  6. ↑ Humanitarian_Organization for Migration Economics (17 May 2015). "HOME: Turning boats away is inhumane". The Online Citizen. Retrieved 3 January 2016.
  7. ↑ "A Batam sex survey shows S'pore men's risky behaviour". inSing.com. Singtel Digital Media Pte Ltd. 25 September 2012. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 3 January 2016.
  8. ↑ Lee, Amanda (8 March 2015). "Foreign domestic workers more likely to develop mental health problems". Today. Mediacorp Press Ltd. Retrieved 3 January 2016.
  9. ↑ Humanitarian_Organization for Migration Economics (4 September 2015). "Foreign workers: Friend or foe? 0". The Online Citizen. Retrieved 3 January 2016.
  10. ↑ Clinton, Hillary Rodham (27 June 2011). "Remarks on the Release of the 2011 Trafficking in Persons Report". United States Department of State . Retrieved 3 January 2016.
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