Project

STREAM - Extending Social Protection to migrant workers and their families in the South Asia-Gulf Corridor

Content also available in: العربية

Project details

Duration

1 December 2024 - 30 November 2028

Development partner(s)

Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation

Reference

RAB/20/01/CHE, INT/24/01/MUL

Contact

Luca Pellerano: [email protected]

Additional details

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Overview

Access to social protection is a fundamental human right, central to the dignity of work, income security, and social justice. Yet, millions of migrant workers around the world — particularly those moving between South Asia and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries— remain excluded or underserved by national social protection systems. Legal restrictions, administrative hurdles, limited portability of benefits, and widespread informality leave many migrant workers and their families vulnerable to poverty, exploitation, and exclusion.

The South Asia–Gulf migration corridor represents one of the world’s most dynamic and complex labour migration routes. In the GCC, migrant workers make up between 76% and 95% of the workforce, predominantly in low-paid, or precarious employment. Despite their central contribution to economic development most face severe obstacles in accessing even basic protections like health care, maternity benefits, unemployment insurance, or compensation for work injuries.

These challenges are further compounded by gender disparities. Women migrant workers, often employed as domestic workers or caregivers, are disproportionately affected by lack of legal protections, fragmented service delivery, and discriminatory practices. Their experience of migration is shaped by intersecting barriers that reduce access to benefits and heighten risk.

The STREAM programme was developed in direct response to these structural inequities.

STREAM - Extending Social Protection to Migrant Workers and their Families in the South Asia–Gulf Corridor is a development cooperation initiative aimed at transforming the social protection landscape for migrant workers across one of the world’s most significant migration corridors.
STREAM is a multi-country multi-partners initiative designed to expand inclusive, gender-responsive, and rights-based social protection coverage to migrant workers across ten countries: Spanning South Asia (Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and India) and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries (Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE), STREAM promotes an inclusive and rights-based approach to social protection.
STREAM builds on the ILO’s century-long mandate to promote social justice and decent work and draws on its technical expertise, normative framework, and partnerships developed through earlier projects in the region.

Rooted in international labour standards and global development commitments, STREAM seeks to address longstanding gaps in protection for migrant workers, particularly for those engaged in low-wage, informal, or precarious employment, and especially women, who face systemic barriers and disproportionate risks throughout the migration cycle.

STREAM aims to foster long-term change, strengthen institutions, and build resilient systems that uphold the rights and dignity of migrant workers and their families. STREAM is about advancing a new paradigm where migrant workers, regardless of gender, status, or sector, can access the social protection systems they need and deserve to live and work in dignity.

Project details

The STREAM programme seeks to contribute to the progressive realization of the right to social protection for migrant workers and their families by pursuing the following interrelated objectives:

Promote inclusive and gender-responsive legal and policy frameworks that ensure access to social protection for migrant workers across the migration cycle, in line with international labour standards and human rights principles.

Strengthen the design, financing, and administration of national social protection systems to facilitate the inclusion of migrant workers in social protection schemes, with a focus on portability and continuity of benefits across borders.

Enhance the effective access of migrant workers and their families to social protection benefits through simplified administrative procedures, improved awareness, grievance mechanisms, and coordinated service delivery.

Foster cross-border and regional cooperation between countries of origin and destination to support bilateral and multilateral arrangements that ensure the transferability and sustainability of social protection entitlements.

Empower institutions, social partners, and civil society actors to engage in evidence-based dialogue, policy development, and monitoring, ensuring that the voices and needs of migrant workers, particularly women, are reflected in social protection reforms.

The programme applies a gender-transformative lens, recognizing the unique vulnerabilities faced by women migrant workers, especially in sectors such as domestic work and care. It aims to ensure that social protection systems are not only accessible but also responsive to the needs and experiences of both women and men, on both ends of the corridor.
To reach this goal, the Program is structured around the attainment of four main outcomes in the course of the 4-year program duration:

Outcome 1 - Policy and regulatory reforms for migrant inclusive and gender sensitive social protection systems across the South-Asian-Gulf corridor are adopted.

Outcome 2 - Effective and inclusive access to existing and new social protection provisions is enhanced for women and men migrant workers.

Outcome 3 - Dialogue and coordination between GCC and South Asian countries on the social protection for migrant workers is strengthened with fair representation of women.

Outcome 4 - A new evidence base enhances advocacy capacities for a gender -sensitive social protection for migrant workers across the South-Asian-Gulf corridor.
The programme focuses on the extension of core protection mechanisms across the following key contingencies:

Employment injury compensation

Health insurance

Maternity and paternity benefits

Unemployment insurance

End-of-service indemnities

And in the following thematic areas

Social protection for workers in new forms of employment, including platform workers

Social protection for domestic workers and the care economy

Social protection for a just climate transition

Portability and exportability of benefits across borders

From 2021 to 2024, the ILO implemented a regional project: Extending social protection to migrant workers: Exploratory Research and Policy Dialogue in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) Countries, with funding from the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC). This initiative laid the groundwork for the STREAM programme by providing evidence, fostering dialogue, and identifying pathways for reform.

The project addressed the exclusion of migrant workers—particularly women and low-wage workers—from social protection systems in six GCC countries: Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. It responded to the urgent need for more inclusive, rights-based social protection, highlighted by the vulnerabilities exposed during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Working through three interconnected pillars of technical assistance, policy dialogue, and evidence-based research, the project achieved the following:

Produced legal and policy assessments of social protection entitlements for migrant workers in the GCC, including gender analysis and returnee surveys in countries of origin.
Initiated policy dialogues and technical engagements with governments, social partners, and institutions in Oman, Kuwait, Qatar, and the UAE.
Supported major reforms, including new maternity benefits for non-nationals in Saudi Arabia, the establishment of provident funds in Bahrain and Oman, and the development of healthcare and social insurance packages in multiple countries.
Promoted a migration corridor approach, linking destination and origin countries—like Nepal and Bangladesh—for joint responsibility in protecting migrant workers’ rights.

The project’s findings, tools, and regional collaborations have become the foundation for the STREAM programme and continue to inform efforts to ensure migrant workers in the GCC can access, on both ends of the corridor, effective, gender-responsive, and sustainable social protection.