Labor Migration in Asia : Recent Trend and Situation of South Korea and the Philippines

"This paper is a discussion of recent trend and situation of labor migration in Asia. Part I focuses on South Korea Many migrant workers have entered Korea under the industrial training system since the beginning of 1990s. However, The industrial training system only granted a migrant worker with trainee status. Therefore, serious problems such as abuse of human rights were raised and an increased number of trainees ran away from their allocated companies. To solve these problems, the government implemented the Employment Permission System (EPS) on August 17 2004. Under this system, foreigners are able to get full legal worker's status. Moreover, the system was expected to reduce the number of unauthorized people by allowing companies to fully employ migrant workers legally. Part I, reviewing one year since enforcement of EPS began, investigates the background, realities and problems of EPS. Part II focuses on the Philippines. About seven million Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) are working in almost two hundred countries. Part II analyzes the economic background, especially the labor conditions of OFW using data mainly from the national statistical agencies. Firstly, it outlines the recent OFWs' tendencies: population, countries where they migrated and jobs engaged in the countries accepting them. Secondly, it analyzes the general economic background which influenced those tendencies, for example, industrial structure, labor market and the overseas migration policies of the Philippines. Thirdly, it analyzes the regional conditions which functioned to make people go abroad, that is, OFW registration rate, underemployment rate, unemployment rate and the poverty incidence rate in each region of the Philippines. Finally, it analyzes OFW's personal attributes such as sex, age, educational background and job which he/she had just before becoming OFW.