Senior officials from Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam (CLMTV) met in the 5th senior labour officials meeting and the 3rd labour minister conference that Cambodia hosted for two days from September 16-17 in Siem Reap.

The senior officials discussed cooperation in the job security sector of the five countries to protect migrant workers. At the conference, ministers and officials sought a joint framework with regard to the mobile social security scheme for migrant workers.

Minister of Labour and Vocational Training Ith Sam Heng said in the meeting that each country had a different legal framework and social and economic status on an international and regional perspective, but CLMTV countries can find common ground to ensure all migrant workers benefited from the social security scheme.

He said during the 2nd Labour Minister’s Conference in 2017 and the 4th Senior Labour Officials meeting in 2018 in Vietnam, attending countries agreed to push for a mechanism to transfer the benefits of the social security scheme from the migrant-worker-receiving country to the migrant-worker-sending country.

Centre for Alliance of Labour and Human Rights (Central) programme manager Khun Tharo told The Post on Monday that the Ministry of Labour said it will push for a social security scheme policy for migrant workers.

The draft Law on Social Security Scheme, which guarantees a social security scheme for migrant workers, has been approved and is now in the hands of the National Assembly.

He said in the past, Cambodia only had a country-to-country Memorandum of Understanding to send migrant workers to South Korea, Malaysia and Thailand.

But, there was no framework to transfer a social security scheme to the National Social Security Fund (NSSF) in Cambodia.