Labor ministry officials say that out of 851,000 Sri Lankans employed in the Gulf states alone, 70.6% are women.

Women in Sri Lanka are no longer secondary income earners within the family. Globalization, market liberalization and structural adjustment have influenced the increase in the number of women in the labor force and the nature of their employment, both within and outside the country. Women constitute 70% to 90% of the labor force in the top three foreign currency generating industries of Sri Lanka. Yet there is a clear deskilling process in all three sectors as these women are integrated into the labour market on unequal terms and are denied access to the acquisition of new skills that would make them upwardly mobile.

Migrant worker remittances brought USD 1.3 billion to Sri Lanka in 2002. Since it is the country's second largest foreign exchange earner and a major boon to restore Sri Lanka's war torn economy, the government actively promotes such migration. The annual outflow of persons from Sri Lanka averaged over 170,000 from 1998 to 2002. Women's contribution to this income is remarkable: a staggering 70% of migrant workers are women; most of them are employed in the Gulf States, Hong Kong, Cypress and Singapore as "unskilled" domestic workers ("housemaids”). Labor ministry officials say that out of 851,000 Sri Lankans employed in the Gulf states alone, 70.6% are women. In 2002, the total outflow of migrant workers from Sri Lanka was 203,710, of which 132,984 were women.

In the late 1970s, the increase in demand for labor from the Middle East saw Sri Lanka become the only country to export women as domestic workers without any restrictions and in such numbers. These flows increased rapidly in the following years, and despite the cultural constraints that hinder women from working, let alone working outside the country, women have shown a great willingness to do so. This is particularly the case for women seeking higher wages if they are already semi-skilled.

The increase in female migration and in semi-skilled factory workers (predominantly garment factory workers) is attributed to a number of factors. One important factor is the higher rate of unemployment among females in Sri Lanka: over twenty percent are unemployed. Faced with poverty and without opportunities for employment, women readily migrated for work which demanded little or no training or experience. Some women also sought to escape from domestic problems like poverty, alcohol addiction among male members of the family, etc.

Many of the sectors demanding female labor overseas have a reputation for high levels of exploitation, sexual harassment and abuse. Housemaids, for example, often work and live in isolation with few days off and may even be prevented from leaving their employer's home so they remain unaware of how poorly they are being treated. The substantial financial contribution of the female migrant workers to Sri Lanka's balance sheet, however, needs to be evaluated against the incalculable personal and social risks to these impoverished women. They frequently undergo a wide range of unexpected hardships before and after their arrival in the country of employment, including: excessive recruiters' charges for securing employment, employers' denial of contract terms, unpaid wages, loss of savings, premature termination of contract, physical and emotional abuse, sexual harassment, rape, and torture that leads to disability, even death. A study by the Centre for Women's Research reports that 10 percent of all Sri Lankan female migrant workers are subject to some form of sexual harassment while abroad. According to the Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment, in 2002 alone there were reports of 114 deaths; 1,756 cases in which the family was unable to contact the migrant; 441 women who went missing after the completion of contracts; and 1,411 women who were sexually harassed. An extreme case recently reported the return to Sri Lanka from Kuwait of the body of a 41-year old woman some of whose organs were found to have been removed. Neither the Kuwaiti nor Sri Lankan government investigated the case adequately.

Even if the victims of abuse are able to contact the Sri Lankan embassy for assistance when experiencing harassment, there may not be sympathetic staff. Indeed, there are some recent cases under investigation of further exploitation of victims by diplomats in the Gulf states. Although many women clearly choose voluntarily to migrate to seek better employment opportunities, government services are not yet well designed to assist female migrants or to respond to the particular forms of exploitation and harassment these women face.

Piyaseeli, who worked in Lebanon, served six months in prison for a crime she never committed and came back home with impaired hearing. This is her story: " I was burdened with lots of household work that left only five hours of sleep per day. However I did my job properly. They never gave me enough to eat and sometimes I had to steal to fulfill my hunger. Another Sri Lankan maid who lived in the neighborhood gave me food. At the end of my first month, I asked for my salary and was shocked to hear that it would be not paid since my employer had spent a great amount of money to get me down. After this they treated me even more badly and increased my workload. Whenever I complained I was severely beaten up. After three months I asked for my wage again explaining the deplorable situation of my children. This time the master slapped me so hard blood poured from my ears and I could not hear anything any more. One day I ran away with the help of the Sri Lankan maid next door to the Sri Lankan Embassy. When I got there they called my employer and gave me back to him. My employer took me to a police station and there I was asked to sign a paper written in Arabic. I signed it because I was scared to go to my employer's house again. Then they locked me in the prison and later I have learnt that I was remanded for stealing money from my employer’s house." Her case is not unique. There are hundreds of Sri Lankan women in Lebanon's prisons unfairly accused of various crimes.

In the recent past, with a tremendous increase in the reporting of incidents of sexual and other violence against Sri Lankan migrant workers, a movement has commenced to use the provisions of the 1990 UN Convention on the Protection of Rights of all Migrant Workers and Their Families as a model to demand the recognition of social, political and economic rights provided by the Convention to migrants. Several lobbying documents have been distributed in an effort to raise the awareness of the contributions and rights of women migrants among policy makers and the public. However, a long term demonstration of increased commitment from government policy makers to address this issue has not been achieved yet.

Of course, the worst culprits in this systemetic abuse of domestic migrant workers are the receiving governments and their citizens. However, the Sri Lankan government cannot expect receiving countries to do anything when they themselves treat these workers as second class citizens.

Shreen Suroor worked for the Canadian International Development Agency - Sri Lanka.