PHAMIT Site Profiles

     
MAP Foundation
    
MAP Foundation works with migrant laborers from various ethnic nationalities in Chiang Mai and with factory workers in Mae Sot to provide greater access to health information and services, and support the labour, health and women's rights of migrants and their families.
 
 
As of March, 2005
 
Chiang Mai
 
Chiang Mai, the northern capital, is developing rapidly. Its sprawling growth has been supported by small industry, tourism and agriculture, which is abundant within 10 km of the city's center. Migrants have filled jobs abandoned by Thais that support this growth, including construction, agriculture, and working in certain aspects of the service industry. In 2004, almost 77,000 migrants including dependents and children registered under the state registry in Chiang Mai Province, with 44,084 migrants obtaining work permits. It is estimated that, including those who registered, there are over 100,000 migrants in the province, including family members, with the majority located within or around the metropolitan area of Chiang Mai City.
    
Target Groups
There are numerous ethnic groups living and working in Chiang Mai Province that have either recently or historically come from Burma. Of these, the Shan and Lahu are two ethnic groups working in Chiang Mai that are highly vulnerable to rights violations, health problems and HIV/AIDS. Generally, migrant workers in Chiang Mai are unfamiliar with occupational safety measures, as their employers do not supply this information or proper safety equipment, leaving migrant workers vulnerable to injury at the workplace. Those coming from Burma are also ignorant about HIV/AIDS due to limited accurate information in their language; and while they may have ready access to commercial sex or casual sex, their access to condoms is limited.
The Shan, also known as Tai Yai, are ethnically related to northern Thais and share many similarities in their language and culture. Shan constitute a large percent of the migrant population in Chiang Mai. Many Shan have fled Burma for survival to escape political oppression and violence, severe economic hardship, or both. Yet, the Shan do not receive any protective status in Thailand (Thailand does not recognize the Shan with formal “refugee” status), forcing them into the economy as migrant laborers, and leaving them vulnerable to arrest and forced repatriation as undocumented migrants. 
 
Shan work in construction, as service workers in small shops and restaurants, in factories of various sizes and on plantations. Young Shan women primarily enter the service industry, which includes restaurants, domestic work and sex work. Shan workers generally stay in residences provided by employers on the work premises, which may result in health problems due to poor sanitation, including limited numbers of toilets, or limitations on mobility, which may impinge on their ability to eat properly. Access to clean water is also problematic. In certain occupations, water for washing comes from an open pit: these pits collect cement and runoff at construction sites, and accumulate pesticides on plantations.
The Lahu is another prominent ethnic group in Chiang Mai. Historically, the Lahu come from Burma. The various tribes (Black, Yellow, Red) are spread out over northern Thailand and eastern Burma, and there are many communities on the Burmese side of the border coming into Thailand for social, political and economic reasons. The Lahu group is one of the ethnic groups that have been granted official hill tribe status by the Thai government. Although Lahu people face less scrutiny than some migrants due to this status, they still lack citizenship and related rights.
         
Lahu people work as daily laborers, in small shops such as restaurants and karaoke bars, small factories and warehouses, and sell flowers on the streets. Many youth are students in vocational schools as well. Due to their hill tribe status, many Lahu are able to live in communities or in dormitories without harassment, but those without official status stay in locations that are hidden.
Some day laborers live in a ramshackle bunch of shanties located over standing-water, next to a major construction site and exposed to excessive amounts of uncollected trash. Another group stays 15 to 20 people in overcrowded rented rooms near a road where they line up each morning to await an employer to choose them for work that day. There is also a Lahu village located just outside the city, which recently moved from a rural area in the mountains due to problems with crops, livelihood and land rights. Being a newly established village, there are only a few pit toilets for over a hundred people.
    
Health Problems
  • Poor sanitation including unclean water supplies and lack of toilets
  • Occupational health hazards and a lack of safety equipment
  • Risky behavior accompanied by low knowledge of HIV/AIDS
  • Limited access to health services and language barriers
 
Activities and Strategies
As part of the PHAMIT Project, MAP Foundation works in Chiang Mai City and in the immediately surrounding districts. Although their programming reaches numerous ethnic groups, including the Karen, MAP Foundation mainly targets Shan and Lahu with interventions under the PHAMIT project. Due to the widely scattered locations, varied types of work, and isolated nature of work, such as small shops and domestic work, it is difficult to know where migrants are in order to contact them. Many migrants are also wary of outsiders for fear of arrest, deportation, bribery, or violence. To overcome these difficulties, MAP's outreach teams of Shan and Lahu rely on interpersonal connections within already established social networks in these communities. Both the Shan and Lahu have an active civil society composed of a variety of community-based, self-help groups as well as tightly knit social networks that MAP has tapped into and helps support to make contact and establish trust with migrants. 
 
MAP's outreach team uses these links to organize workshops on HIV/AIDS, reproductive health and rights for the different language groups usually by occupation - construction, agriculture, etc. Volunteers from the different occupations and language groups are then trained to represent their locale by helping to organize activities, including activities for children, and by providing condoms and assisting with referral to health services. When MAP is able to successfully negotiate with an owner of a dorm or workplace to make condoms available through a distribution box, volunteers will supply and maintain these boxes. Volunteers also assist in health referral. When a migrant calls into MAP's central crisis support center, the operator dispatches the closest available volunteer to assist the caller in overcoming barriers of transportation and language. 
The crisis center, in part, has been promoted and supported by numerous IEC materials that MAP has produced on HIV/AIDS, family planning, and rights in migrant's different languages. Materials include brochures, booklets, audiotapes and CDs - the latter being facilitated by an in-house studio created to support a long-standing radio program MAP has been producing for some time.

Activities
Description
  
Outreach  

Workshops (varying in numbers of participants) teach migrant youth and laborers about HIV/AIDS, reproductive health and family planning.  
Volunteers Volunteers receive on-going training, conduct situation assessments, lead participatory workshops and small group activities, and are responsible for condom boxes.  
Condom distribution

Condoms are distributed directly at activities and by volunteers, and are available through condom boxes placed at dormitories and karaoke shops.

 
IEC materials Audiocassettes and CDs on HIV/AIDS as well as brochures on HIV/AIDS, health and labor rights have been produced and distributed in migrants' languages.  
Referral and counseling MAP's crisis support center dispatches trained volunteers to assist migrants in navigating the health system, and to provide translation assistance to pregnant migrant women being tested for HIV.  
Community activities Informal education activities for migrant children provide information on hygiene, health, and allow children to express themselves through art.  
Rights and advocacy MAP has given workshops for migrant workers to assist them in understanding their rights and the migrant registration system, so that they may transmit this information to their peers.