Indonesia Boosts Protection for Women Migrant Workers

By: Women Entrepreneurs Review Team | Friday, 17 July 2026

The Government of Indonesia is bolstering protection for women migrant workers with a new international initiative to strengthen coordination between labor authorities, law enforcement agencies and community organizations in combating human trafficking and forced labor. The project seeks to build their capacity to detect trafficking at an early stage, enhance the protection of victims and promote safe migration routes for thousands of workers, especially women, who are expected to be at the first point of contact with the authorities.

The project is being established in the framework of the PROTECT Project supported by the European Union and implemented by the International Labor Organization (ILO) and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). The program is aimed at helping Indonesian authorities tackle labor exploitation and trafficking in order to improve the cooperation between the labor migration system and the criminal justice system.

The project held a series of joint capacity building workshops from March to May 2026 in five major districts which are also the main districts for migrant workers (Cirebon, Deli Serdang, Kupang, Tulungagung and Lampung Timur). The training sessions were attended by over 200 participants from various local governments, police departments, prosecutors' offices, labor agencies, trade unions, migrant worker support centres and civil society organizations.

Key Highlights:

• Indonesia strengthens protection for women migrant workers through the EU-backed PROTECT Project
• Over 200 frontline officials trained to improve anti-trafficking coordination and victim support
• One Stop Centres expand legal, healthcare and safe migration services for women workers

The workshops were centered on two key areas: case management that takes a gender perspective and coordination among institutions with responsibility for the protection of labor and criminal investigation. The organizers said that trafficking frequently has multiple dimensions, requiring a multi-agency response to safeguard trafficking victims and hold perpetrators to account.

The One Stop Centre integrated with Migrant Worker Resource Centre (MRC) model is a key component of the initiative. These centers offer a variety of basic services to both incoming and outgoing migrant workers such as pre-departure information, legal counseling, and psychosocial assistance, healthcare referrals and case management. The centers have already supported thousands of migrant workers in the districts where the scheme is being implemented, mainly women.

The program also has a strong focus on community outreach and awareness raising initiatives targeting vulnerable groups. The program aims to sensitize communities on how to migrate safely, the legal procedures to follow when migrating abroad and the dangers of trafficking in order to lower the risk of workers being exploited before leaving for employment overseas.

Indonesia's women migrant workers still suffer from various types of exploitation during the migration process. In certain areas, authorities have documented deceptive recruitment, exploitation and trafficking through labor brokers, false marriage, forced labor and increasingly, through online recruitment fraud. As recruiters are increasingly making use of digital platforms, new challenges have arisen that force frontline officers to think outside the box when it comes to recognizing indicators of trafficking.

Many trafficking cases are still being wrongly treated as administrative labor or immigration offences, rather than a crime, is one of the recurring issues mentioned by project partners. This misclassification can cause victim protection delays, reduce access to justice and make it more difficult to investigate trafficking networks.

The training program also provided hands-on training on governance of labor migration, victim identification, data collection, investigation processes and the difference between human trafficking and migrant smuggling, to address these gaps. In addition, participants also set up district coordination mechanisms and action plans aimed at enhancing information sharing and long-term institutional cooperation.

The program is part of Indonesia's larger strategy to improve the condition of safe labor migration, keeping in line with international labor standards and the international labor migration and trafficking agreements. The program aims to forge a more streamlined protection system aimed at protecting women migrant workers from recruitment into overseas employment and eventual return, by connecting labor institutions, criminal justice agencies and civil society organizations.

Officials and international partners are convinced that enhancing institutional coordination, the application of gender-sensitive protection tools and community awareness will be essential to minimize the risks of trafficking and create safe, legal and dignified employment opportunities for migrant workers, as labor migration remains an important factor in Indonesia's economy.