Women, Work and International Migration in Southeast Asia: Trends, Patterns and Policy

In the massive expansion of international migration in Southeast Asia over the last two decades a striking feature has been the feminisation of that movement. In several countries of origin of international migrants, females are a major element in the movement, if not the majority of out-migrants. Similarly, in the countries which are the main destinations of international migrants, all have a significant in-movement of women. Yet this movement remains little understood in the region. Indeed its measurement is problematic because data collection systems in Southeast Asia are under-developed, much of the movement occurs outside official migration systems and there is an inbuilt bias in existing census and surveys which leads them to not detect female immigrants. Nevertheless, women are involved in the full gamut of international movement in Southeast Asia. It is important to study the movement of women separately from those of men for a number of reasons: the patterns differ from those of men; the causes and consequences of movement can differ from those of men; the policy implications of movement can differ from those of men.