RESEARCH PAPERS

In the Shadow of the Ships: Indonesia (IOM, 2023)
This study assesses the labour migration process of internal migrant workers employed in lower tiers of supply chains in Indonesia’s pre- and primary seafood processing sector: small and medium enterprises, home-based workplaces and on the pier. The study findings informed actionable recommendations to the Government of Indonesia and private sector actors on better protection of all workers in the seafood processing sector.

Pakistan’s tanning and leather industries: An overview of trends and labour and environmental conditions (ILO, 2023)
This report identifies entry points for improved compliance with national and international labour standards, including macro and micro-level interventions to strengthen the capacities of enterprises to comply with national and international labour and environmental standards.This research provides a reference point for stakeholders engaged in supporting Pakistan’s small-and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to improve the sector’s labour and environmental compliance standards, sustainability and competitiveness.

Towards freedom at sea: Handbook for the detection of forced labour in commercial fishing (ILO, 2023)
Praxis Labs supported the development of the handbook through an extensive literature review and interviews. The Handbook focuses on the detection of forced labour in the context of industrial fishing activities, including distant water fishing. Its tools are relevant for fisheries worldwide, but the tools require adaptation to each country’s legal frameworks and fishing industry characteristics.

In the shadow of the ships: Thailand - migrant workers in the lower tiers of the seafood processing sector (IOM, 2023)
This study assessed the labour migration process of Cambodian and Myanmar migrant workers employed in the lower tiers of Thailand’s seafood processing sector, as well as the specific challenges faced by women migrant workers. Its findings show that land-based migrant workers in the lower tiers of the seafood processing supply chain continue facing human and labour rights abuses, and are excluded from basic labour protections, such as minimum wages, maximum hours of work, paid sick leave and social security. The study provides constructive recommendations to government and the private sector, aligned with the National Action Plan on Business and Human Rights. 

Northern France and Belgium: Mixed Migration Trends and Dynamics (Mixed Migration Centre (MMC), 2023)
This report presents the findings of a study into mixed migration dynamics in northern France and Belgium, including considerations regarding onward movement to the UK. Through a literature review, 42 key informant interviews and 29 interviews with refugees and migrants conducted in four locations in Belgium and northern France, it provides detailed insights into the interactions between policy and route dynamics and decision-making, current conditions in Belgium and northern France, and the serious protection issues faced by refugees and migrants in the region.

Challenges and opportunities to advance decent work in five countries and supply chains: A synthesis report (ILO, 2023)
This report, developed for the International Labour Organization Sectoral Policies Department (SECTOR), summarizes the findings from rapid assessments and deep-dive research into decent work challenges and opportunities in five sectors and countries: coffee in Colombia, electronics in Viet Nam, fisheries in Namibia, rubber gloves in Malaysia and textiles and clothing in Madagascar.

Decent work challenges and opportunities in Malaysia’s rubber glove supply chain (International Labour Organization, 2023)
Focusing on three tiers of the rubber glove supply chain in Malaysia – smallholder rubber farms, rubber processors and rubber glove manufacturers, this report strengthens the evidence base on the decent work challenges and opportunities across the four strategic objectives of the Decent Work Agenda: employment creation, rights at work, social protection and social dialogue.

The Case for Investing in Animal Health to Support One Health (Action for Animal Health Coalition (A4AH), 2023)
The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the deep connection between animals, humans, and the wider environment. As a result, the One Health approach is receiving increased political attention as a solution to some of the greatest health threats we face today – including increasing zoonotic disease emergence, antimicrobial resistance (AMR), and food safety and security. Yet weaknesses in animal health systems will hinder the implementation of One Health. Underinvestment in animal health systems has led to critical shortages in animal health workforces, medicines and vaccines, barriers to service delivery and access, poor disease surveillance, and worsening welfare issues. This report outlines the current state of animal health systems in low-and middle-income countries (LMICs), with a particular focus on Ethiopia and Pakistan. It sets out the case for why we need to pay closer attention to the health of the animals we depend on to implement One Health and for sustainable development.

Deep-dive research into decent work challenges and opportunities in Namibia’s fishing supply chain (International Labour Organization, 2022)
This report discusses the challenges and opportunities to sustainably develop Namibia's seafood and fisheries sector. Namibia is well positioned within international and regional trade and investment frameworks and initiatives to further develop its fisheries and seafood sector in line with its development plans. However, there remain important gaps to be addressed in its legal framework and financial planning prioritization to achieve sustainable decent work in the sector. 

Adapting on the move: Climate change displacement and local solutions in coastal communities in Sindh, Pakistan (Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, 2021) 
Climate change displacement in Sindh’s coastal zone is a gradual and complex process, and a mix of temporary and permanent, forced and voluntary migration. Socioeconomic and political factors make people vulnerable to hazards, with disasters causing significant land and livelihood loss, ultimately resulting in displacement. This paper discusses the main determinants and pathways to climate change displacement, and adaptive responses strengthening displaced people’s agency against ongoing threats. Supported by sufficient resources, policies and institutional frameworks, community-based organisations can play an important role in enhancing adaptive capacity in current locations and supporting safe onwards migration.

ILO working paper: Study on the recruitment and placement of migrant fishers from Indonesia  (International Labour Organization: 2020)
This study addresses one of the key concerns of the Indonesian Government and stakeholders: the protection of Indonesian migrant fishers. Fishers are often employed by third parties, such as Private Employment Agencies (PrEAs), rather than directly by the fishing vessel owner. Lack of transparency regarding the recruitment process increases the risk of harm to the migrant fisher abroad. Illegal and fraudulent recruitment and placement practices may also lead to human trafficking and forced labour. Monitoring of the different stages of the recruitment and placement process needs to be improved.

Child Labour in the Context of Migration  (International Organization for Migration and UNICEF: 2019)
Launched for International Migrants Day 2019, this policy paper is based on a literature review on child labour in the context of migration. Its main findings show the impact of migration status, education, resources and traditions, providing key policy recommendations to Alliance 8.7 partners. Two country contexts are highlighted as brief case studies: Cote d’Ivoire and Nepal. 

Indonesia's fisheries human rights certification system: assessment, commentary and recommendations  (International Labour Organization: 2019)
This study provides an overview of the national framework for fisheries, looking at the design of Indonesia’s fisheries human rights certification system and identifies challenges in its implementation, followed by a contextualization of Indonesia’s fisheries human rights certification system as a private compliance initiative (PCI) within broader industry efforts to improve labour conditions, providing recommendations to strengthen the enforcement of labour standards and human rights protection for fishers and other workers in Indonesia’s fishing and seafood industry.

Tracking Progress: Assessing Business Responses to Forced Labour and Human Trafficking in the Thai Seafood Industry  (Humanity United and The Freedom Fund: 2019)
The report is based on interviews, focus group discussions and surveys with private sector representatives, civil society organizations (CSOs) and workers in Thailand. It includes an overview of the seafood capture and production sector, improvements made since the Humanity United / Freedom Fund report 'Assessing Government and Business Responses to forced labour and human trafficking' in 2016, and provides recommendations focusing on an improved business model to use sourcing decisions to advocate for workers’ rights and institutionalize change.

Pakistan's hidden workers: wages and conditions of home-based workers and the informal economy (International Labour Organization: 2017)
This report sets out the findings of research carried out between May and December 2016 in two locations in Karachi looking at Pakistan’s informal economy and the supply chains existing within the textile and garment sector. It focuses on the deep value chain and describes a complex system of supply in the informal economy and provides information on comparable hours wage rates for the most common types of home-based work in the textile and garment sector.
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Community Resilience and Disaster-Related Displacement in South Asia  (Norwegian Refugee Council: 2015)
This report examines the resilience of communities in South Asia to disasters and the displacement they cause. It considers their risk landscape and resilience capacity in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. The research analyses the multidimensional risks communities face, their assets, and the institutional and legal frameworks in which they operate. It considers communities’ capacity to prevent displacement, their ability to mitigate protection risks during displacement and their options in terms of durable solutions. The report offers a resilience building framework that incorporates common principles, while retaining flexibility and adaptability to communities’ specific risk environments. It makes recommendations for improving it and preparing for the challenges of increasing risks, so preventing or at least reducing the impact of displacement.

POLICY BRIEFS

Migrant workers and zoonotic health inequalities in the livestock production sector (International Organization for Migration (IOM), 2023)
This policy paper, co-authored with Dr Kolitha Wickramage (IOM Berlin) and Dr Patrick Duigan (IOM Bangkok), highlights the urgent need to address the risk of zoonoses - diseases transmissible between animals and humans - to migrant workers in the livestock production value chain. As the pandemic exposed the link between employment and labour challenges in the livestock product supply chain and zoonoses, primarily affecting socio-economic marginalized producers and workers, including migrant communities, the paper argues for the inclusion of migrants into evidence-building and actions for multilevel and interdisciplinary zoonotic disease prevention and control, with recommendations to policy makers and responders on how to improve zoonotic disease mitigation and the general wellbeing of migrants.

Climate change, migration, and zoonoses in the East and Horn of Africa region: A call for action (IOM, 2023)
This technical brief, developed in collaboration with IOM East and Horn of Africa, presents an overview of the available evidence connecting climate change, migration, and zoonotic disease risk in East and Horn of Africa, highlighting the gaps in policy and programming for the human mobility and global health security nexus, and providing key recommendations to policymakers and implementing agencies. In particular, migrants and host populations need to be included in the development of policies and programs, and their agency supported through enabling inclusive legal frameworks and direct funding. Importantly, any investments in veterinary and public health processes and changes need to be locally meaningful and selfsustaining in the long-term. 
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Applying the One Health approach to mitigate zoonotic disease risk in forced migration (School of Transnational Governance, European University Institute, 2022)
This policy paper presents an overview of the currently available evidence on the connection between forced migration and zoonotic disease risks and vulnerabilities, based on primary and secondary research into zoonoses in displacement. These interconnected areas will become increasingly urgent in the face of accelerating climate change, conflict, and increased interaction between wildlife, domestic animals and humans during forced migration. The paper highlights how global health security requires an interdisciplinary and multilevel One Health approach to address human, animal and environmental health simultaneously. The approach allows for addressing policy and programming gaps in the human mobility and global health security nexus, especially relevant in the context of increasing conflict, disasters and climate change emergencies. This policy brief provides key recommendations to policy makers and practitioners in the area of global health security, migration and wider humanitarian policy and responses.
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ACADEMIC PUBLICATIONS

A fair share? Animal health actors and resources in One Health initiatives: A multisite case study in Ethiopia and Pakistan (CABI One Health, 2023)
This article presents the findings of a transdisciplinary research project investigating the roles and contributions of animal health in One Health initiatives. We found that while One Health has become more interdisciplinary and inclusive at a global level, there remain significant challenges in operationalizing the approach at national and subnational levels. Gaps in governance, political will, and capacity undermine the inclusion of animal health in One Health structures. Power and resources are distributed unequally across One Health coalitions, echoing observations that acknowledge the crucial role of communities in supporting the provision of essential services, while their knowledge and experiences often remain excluded from project and policy development. We conclude that stronger multilevel linkages and engagement between animal health and other sectors are vital to support the implementation of inclusive, well-resourced, and effective One Health approaches.

Zoonoses in the margins: environmental displacement and health outcomes in the Indus Delta (Intl Journal for Equity in Health, 2022)
This study investigates zoonotic disease dynamics in populations regularly displaced due to slow onset disasters and annual monsoons in Sindh province in southeast Pakistan. Key factors affecting zoonotic disease dynamics included disasters and loss of forage, a lack of veterinary and healthcare access, and socio-economic status. Displacement results in a poverty spiral whereby the displaced find themselves at continuous peril from poverty and disaster, with zoonotic disease dynamics shifting based on environmental changes, and an expectation of future movement and loss.

DOGS OF WAR: Keeping the Wolves at Bay (EUI, 2022)
In the context of global crises, including increasing conflict, disasters, reduced food security, and more recently the COVID-19 pandemic, questions around human and animal mobility and health are becoming increasingly complex. While currently animals are often not facilitated in humanitarian and refugee responses out of concern for zoonoses (infectious diseases transmissible between animals and humans), animals - domestic pets as well as livestock - are essential to livelihoods, nutrition and mental health. Faced with increased conflict and climate mobility, are current laws and regulations fit for purpose? How can countries best facilitate animals in forced migration, while protecting the health of the displaced and host populations, and what considerations must be made across sectors and governance levels? This case study aims to introduce an often neglected question around forced migration: what do we do with the animals?

Excluding Livestock Livelihoods in Refugee Responses: A Risk to Public Health (Journal of Refugee Studies, 2022)
This case study investigates zoonotic disease dynamics in the Syrian refugee context in Jordan. Key informant interviews were conducted with humanitarian, animal and public health experts, and household interviews with Jordanian and Syrian livestock keepers in Mafraq Governorate. Respondents attributed zoonotic disease outbreaks to cross-border smuggling of livestock, with no reports of refugees bringing animals into Jordan. While Syrian respondents diversify their livelihoods through animal husbandry, high-level political and practical barriers affect refugees’ access to livestock assistance, increasing zoonotic disease risks. To support animal and human health, structural inequalities need to be addressed through inclusive policies and support to both refugees and host populations.

​Lockdowns, lives and livelihoods: the impact of COVID-19 and public health responses to conflict affected populations - a remote qualitative study in Baidoa and Mogadishu, Somalia (BMC Conflict and Health, 2021)
This study looks at how some of the most at-risk internally displaced and host populations were impacted by COVID-19, what determined their responses, and how this affected their health and socio-economic vulnerability. While the official COVID-19 burden remained relatively low in Somalia, the impact to people’s lives, income and livelihoods has been significant. Participants describe those ‘secondary’ outcomes as the main impact of the pandemic, serving as a stark reminder of the need to broaden the public health response beyond disease prevention to include social and economic interventions to decrease people’s vulnerability to future shocks.
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Disaster displacement and zoonotic disease dynamics: The impact of structural and chronic drivers in Sindh, Pakistan (PLOS Global Public Health, 2021)
Displacement driven by climate change, disasters and related environmental degradation has significant implications to global health. Pathways for infectious disease transmission including zoonoses, diseases transmitted between animals and humans, are complex and non-linear. This paper investigates how disaster displacement affected zoonotic disease transmission risk in Sindh province. Livestock was an important consideration in determining displacement modality and destination, however rarely included in the humanitarian response, resulting in communities and households fragmenting according to the availability of livestock provisions. Findings have implications for policy makers and humanitarian responders, with a call to better integrate livestock support in humanitarian policies and responses for health, survival and recovery.
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Identifying the research gap of zoonotic disease in displacement: a systematic review (Global Health Research and Policy, 2021)
This literature review shows significant gaps in the literature on zoonotic disease in displacement, which is specifically lacking primary data. Risk factors for the transmission of zoonoses in displacement are based on generic infectious disease risks, which include the loss of health services, increased population density, changes in environment, reduced quality of living conditions and socio-economic factors. Due to the lack of primary research, the complex interlinkages of factors affecting zoonotic pathogen transmission in displacement remain unclear. 

Integrating Resilience in South Asia (Forced Migration Review: 2015)
Forced Migration Review published this summary article on the complexity of displacement drivers and vulnerability to future disasters. Vulnerability to displacement may be reduced by preparing for disasters and climate change. Once displacement does occur, more resilient communities are able to reduce the risks associated with displacement by a more efficient restoration of their essential structures and functions. What makes a community resilient differs from place to place, related to the geography, climate, economy, politics, people and so on. Put simply: the more resilient a community, the less the risk and impact of displacement.