 |
| Congen Catalla thanks Dr. Licuanan. |
Food, education and housing remain as the top three reasons why Filipinos feel compelled to go abroad to work;
Half of them leave because they have no job. Of those who were employed, more than 60% were earning less than Php5,000 a month;
About a third of those who leave for Hong Kong has a college degree, while another 20% has had some college education;
Seventy percent of Hong Kong OFWs is from Luzon;
These were just some of the preliminary results of a two-year study on household service (domestic) workers presented at the Consulate on Jan. 17 by Victoria Licuanan, research fellow and former dean of the Asian Institute of Management.
The study, which involves 2,000 first-time HSWs – 1,200 bound for Saudi Arabia and 800 for Hong Kong – is aimed at looking at the impact of four new modules in finance and welfare included in the pre-departure orientation seminar (PDOS).
“We are not evaluating PDOS per se, but are looking for new modes for PDOS,” said Licuanan.
But she admitted that the initial results yielded a range of interesting findings that could cause a rethink for policy-makers, especially those tasked with the country’s overall migration management.
She also said there appears to be a need to make the PDOS a more integrated process, to include local government units, non-government organizations, and even the consulates and embassies abroad.
“Maybe we have reached the limit of the four-hour PDOS?” Licuanan asked.
The respondents who were chosen randomly from those taking the pre-departure seminars at the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration were first interviewed between May 26 and August 15, 2014.
They were asked about their personal and family background, their financial literacy including savings and borrowing habits and plans for savings and remittances, as well as expenditure plans; communication with their family members, attitudes, and feelings of well-being.
A follow-up interview by telephone was made in the third quarter of last year with the OFW respondents as well as their family members back in the Philippines. But by then, nearly a third of the respondents could no longer be traced.
“Our sample size has declined to roughly 70 percent of the original sample due to the following reasons: the HSW returned or never left, they cannot be contacted, or refused to be interviewed,” said Licuanan.
A second round of interviews is due to be carried out middle of this year.
The study’s initial results also showed the following:
• the average age of first-time HSWs is 31 years old; but the age range of the respondents was 15-57 years old
• two out of three are married, divorced or widowed
• the average household size is 4.3 people for HK OFWs and 4.7 for those bound for Saudi Arabia
• 60% of those who went to HK knew at least one person in the territory, compared to just 25% for those bound for Saudi
• half of those surveyed did not have any experience working as domestic helpers
• about 50% said they expected to be away for only 2 years while between 10-15% said they would work for 10 years
• 23% of those who were Saudi-bound said their family was totally dependent on their remittance, compared to only 15% for those who went to HK
• 35% of family members of the HK OFWs said the worker contacted home daily, while 27% said the same thing for the Saudi OFW
• a whopping 90% of HK OFWs described their employers as “good” or “ok”; while 80% among the Saudi-bound said the same thing;
• 70% of all HK-bound OFWs said they paid placement fees, compared to only 20% for those who went to Saudi. The average agency fee paid by those bound for HK amounted to Php64,811 while those for Saudi paid Php37,795
Licuanan suggested that the second follow-up interview for the respondents who are in Hong Kong be conducted with help from the Consulate.
