MANILA, Philippines—An advocacy group has called on concerned government agencies to draft better provisions that would strengthen the rights of Filipino migrants working in different countries across the world.

In a forum at the University of the Philippines, the Center for Migrant Advocacy Philippines Inc. (CMA) urged both the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Philippine Overseas Employment Agency (POEA) to come up with better bilateral agreements with foreign countries to protect the rights of Filipinos abroad.

Bilateral labor agreements are reached between two countries to establish regulated labor migration and that protection of workers and promotion of their rights are part of the agenda, CMA said.

Bilateral agreements, CMA said, are important for the country especially since it ranked third in the world in terms of the number of people leaving the country to find work overseas.

Based on CMA data, there are 8.7 million Filipinos working abroad, 4.13 million of whom were working in contractual or temporary jobs in Middle East countries, while 3.69 million were working in permanent jobs.

In a research paper presented by its interns, CMA revealed several problems in bilateral agreements entered upon by the country.

“Unfortunately, past and present Philippine bilateral agreements are all too general and do not sufficiently promote and protect the fundamental human rights of migrant workers. They lack a human rights framework and approach,” according to a report made by CMA interns Lauren Manalang and Marizen Santos.

Based on records from the POEA, as of September this year, the country has 34 agreements with 22 countries on employment welfare and labor cooperation; 12 agreements with 10 countries on social security; and 44 agreements on recognition of seafarer’s certificates.

Another report by CMA interns Loubna Amarir and Justine Little also revealed that social security agreements entered by the government with foreign countries “contain no provisions to protect the rights of undocumented migrants or other marginalized groups.”

Amarir and Little’s report also said that there was a low level of awareness among migrant workers on the importance of social security.

The problem, both reports said, lies in the drafting of the agreements between the government and a foreign country.

Both reports stated that there was limited or no participation of non-government organizations in the drafting of the bilateral agreements.

“There is also a lack of consultation and transparency with specific stakeholders in the drafting of bilateral agreements,” Manalang and Santos’s report said.

Director Liberty Casco of the POEA said that bilateral agreements have helped protect the rights of Filipino migrants in different countries.

However, she admitted that there needs to be an expansion of these agreements to cover the minority of the migrants, or the so-called “vulnerable” migrants, who do not have access to job security.

Based on CMA data, in 2006, 58.7 percent of migrants are women, most of whom working in unregulated jobs making them vulnerable to abuses.

Vulnerable migrants, Casco said, are entertainers and even domestic workers.

“There has to be an expansion of the coverage of the elements of the bilateral agreements to promote migration development,” she added.