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<p class="MsoNormal"><b>From:</b> WUNRN_LISTSERVE-owner@lists.wunrn.com [mailto:WUNRN_LISTSERVE-owner@lists.wunrn.com]
<b>On Behalf Of </b>WUNRN LISTSERVE<br>
<b>Sent:</b> Saturday, October 21, 2017 8:04 AM<br>
<b>To:</b> WUNRN ListServe <wunrn_listserve@lists.wunrn.com><br>
<b>Subject:</b> [WUNRN] Indonesia - Women Domestic Workers Fight Exploitation with IOL Training & Professional Skills Certificate<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">WUNRN<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><a href="http://www.wunrn.com/">http://www.wunrn.com</a><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><a href="http://news.trust.org/item/20171016230809-uxn9d/">http://news.trust.org/item/20171016230809-uxn9d/</a><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-top-alt:15.0pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in">
<span style="font-size:16.0pt;font-family:inherit;color:#333333">Indonesia – Women Domestic Workers Fight Exploitation with ILO Training & Professional Skills Certificate
<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-top-alt:15.0pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in">
<img border="0" width="673" height="468" id="Picture_x0020_1" src="cid:image002.jpg@01D349EF.5D396410"><span style="font-size:16.0pt;font-family:inherit;color:#333333"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">Domestic workers wait to have their passports done at an immigration office in Tangerang, Indonesia's Banten province. REUTERS/Beawiharta<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:22.5pt"><b><span style="font-size:13.0pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">Maids in Indonesia are not considered formal workers, leaving them vulnerable to abuses and unprotected under local labour laws.<o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">By Beh Lih Yi<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 17 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Like millions of Indonesian women who earn a living through
domestic work, Leni Suryani thought that long hours for a meagre salary was just the lot of a maid.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">But a pilot training scheme for domestic workers helped her improve her skills and earn a certificate, giving
her the confidence to ask for a higher salary.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">"I have been a domestic helper for 15 years, I didn't think this piece of paper is important, I was wrong," said
the 33-year-old mother, who worked as a maid in Singapore and Malaysia for six years before returning to Indonesia in 2003.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">Suryani is one the first graduates from the training which aims to enhance domestic workers' skills and win recognition
for their work as a profession in a bid to fight exploitation and modern slavery.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">While Indonesia is a major provider of maids for places like Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong and the Middle East,
some four million Indonesian women are also employed in households locally to cook, clean or to look after children and the elderly.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">Maids account for the biggest group of Indonesian women who work. Despite this, they are not considered formal
workers, leaving them vulnerable to abuses and unprotected under local labour laws.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">Excessive working hours, lack of a formal contract, unpaid wages are just some of the most common abuses Indonesian
domestic helpers face, according to campaigners.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">Unlike their counterparts who work overseas, who must go through extensive training regulated by the government,
there are no such provisions for local maids.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">Suryani said she brushed up her skills on cooking different cuisines, housekeeping and childcare during her training,
as well as learning English and using computers.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">At the end of the 200-hour course last year and after a test, she received a certificate given by a national
professional certification board that recognised her skills.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">"It taught me how to work more efficiently," Suryani told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by phone from Jakarta.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">"My employer, an American expatriate family, was happy with the certificate I got and the way I work, it gave
me confidence to ask for a higher salary and they agreed."<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">OVERWORKED, UNDERPAID, UNPROTECTED<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">The International Labour Organization (ILO), which runs the training with local workers' groups, said about 200
women have been trained in different batches since 2016, with the most recent group of 40 completing their course in August this year.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">Its national advocacy specialist, Irfan Afandi, said domestic work is poorly regulated in Indonesia, and most
maids are overworked, underpaid and unprotected.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">Some earn as little as the equivalent of $150 each month.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">"The laws don't see them as formal workers and many maids themselves are unaware of what exploitation is," Afandi
said.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">"They think working from 6am to 8 pm is normal and they should do anything they are told - from cooking to car
washing and gardening. There is no clear scope of their job."<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">Globally over 40 million people are trapped as slaves last year in forced labour and forced marriages, new estimates
by key anti-slavery groups last month showed.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">This includes those who work as domestic workers, and Asia Pacific has the second-highest prevalence of modern
slavery after Africa.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">Widespread abuses and near slave-like living conditions of Indonesian women who work abroad as domestic helpers
have captured the media limelight in the past but such mistreatment within Indonesia often gets less attention.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">The ILO's training not only teaches domestic workers skills, but also educates them on workers' rights.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">"They are confident because now they are professional domestic workers. They learnt the skills, it increases
their employability and prospects for better work conditions," Afandi said.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">For Suryani, the certificate help to break the stereotype that her work is "unskilled" and only meant for the
poor and uneducated. She is now volunteering to train other domestic workers and pass on what she has learned.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:7.5pt;line-height:22.5pt"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:#333333">"I am a proud domestic worker!" she said.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">_____________________________________________<o:p></o:p></p>
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