Challenges

At the time of the project, Türkiye was hosting the largest number of refugees in the world – four million – for the seventh year in a row. The vast majority, close to 3.6 million, originated from Syria, while 400,000 are Afghanis, Iranians, and Iraqis. Meanwhile, Colombia was hosting more than 1.7 million refugees and migrants from Venezuela due to the complex socio-economic and political situation in that country.  

In the context of COVID-19, many migrant and refugee workers, particularly women, faced even greater difficulties, with increasing unemployment, lack of social protection and worsening working conditions. With refugee populations facing similar challenges, Columbia and Türkiye decided to join forces to improve the status of refugee workers.

Toward a Solution

To address the challenge, the International Labour Organization (ILO) supported the “Strengthening the Humanitarian-Development Nexus through the Promotion of Decent Work in Refugee and Mixed Migration Contexts” initiative. This initiative provided tripartite partners (governments, workers, and employers) from Colombia and Türkiye a platform to exchange knowledge and experiences on how to promote access to decent work for migrants and refugees. Building on the two countries’ experiences receiving large-scale refugee and mixed migratory flows from neighbouring countries, exchanges were facilitated to support efforts to design inclusive labour market policies, with a specific focus on COVID-19 response.

During this exercise, ILO facilitated the assessment of ongoing and past interventions in Türkiye to analyse their replicability and possible improvement in Colombia and vice versa. This was requested by the Government of Colombia, as well as workers and employers in the country. The Turkish participants, in line with the principle of mutual benefit (SSTC, BAPA +40), felt that Türkiye’s ILO tripartite constituents could learn from the initiative.

More than 30 tripartite constituents from both countries participated. Three main themes were discussed: 1) labour market governance; 2) inclusive employment policies; and 3) the informal labour market and access to social protection for migrant and refugee workers and host communities.

Capacity development activities were offered through webinars and exchanges among the tripartite partners, with support from the ILO International Training Centre (ITCILO). The virtual webinars used innovative and engaging pedagogical e-moderating methodologies. In discussion sessions, good practices for inclusion of refugees in the labour market were shared, as well as innovative solutions, ranging from registering and formalizing migrants and refugees (for example, with temporary work permits), delivering courses on non-discrimination, language and cultural adaptation, simplifying access to social protection and social security, among other topics.

The initiative supported tripartite partners to adopt development approaches to strengthening the resilience of refugees, migrants and host communities to overcome labour market challenges, while at the same time complementing humanitarian interventions. The good practice promoted the achievement of the 2030 agenda, in particular SDG 8 (decent work and economic growth) and SDG 10 (reduced inequalities). Furthermore, it supports the concepts of leaving no one behind and ensuring human rights for all, providing a powerful basis for inclusion