PH eyes gov't-to-gov't deal with Korea on deployment of seasonal Filipino workers

The Philippine government, through the Department of Migrant Workers (DMW), is eyeing to forge a binding legal agreement with South Korea concerning the seasonal deployment of Filipino farm workers to the Asian country.

DMW Officer-in-Charge Hans Cacdac said the agency is in talks with the South Korean government to establish a "national government-to-national government approach" in relation to Seoul's seasonal workers program (SWP).

"What I meant is we would have a binding legal agreement between the two nations, the Philippines and South Korea," Cacdac said.

The first batch of 39 seasonal farm workers from the towns of Apalit, Lubao, and Magalang in Pampanga flew to South Korea this week. Currently, the SWP program is managed by the Korean Ministry of Justice and the Korean Immigration Service.

The DMW official said a binding legal agreement with South Korea is on top of the agency's "wish list."

Cacdac said the Philippines already has an existing binding agreement with the government of South Korea on the employment permit system, "which involves government-to-government hiring [of] factory workers since 2002."

"That's what we want in this situation… We have been in talks already with the Korean government. They are open to discussing it," he said.

"However, we are still a long way ahead in these discussions toward an agreement. We are already on track and hopefully in the near future we can see the materialization of this national to national government agreement," he added.

There are 3,353 Filipino seasonal workers in South Korea as of December 2023.

In January, the DMW imposed a moratorium on the deployment of seasonal workers following complaints from Filipino workers.

To address the situation, the agency earlier said it would issue permanent guidelines for the deployment of Filipino seasonal workers, which would cover their standards of protection, fair treatment, decent working hours and wages, access to justice, and the monitoring and prohibition against exorbitant fees.

Meanwhile, the DMW reminded Filipinos that the application for the SWP is free and advised the public to report individuals asking for recruitment fees. — VDV, GMA Integrated News