Recruitment and Labor Intermediaries
Migrant Worker
A worker who has moved across regions or borders for work and may face added contract, language, housing, and recruitment risks.
Definition
Migrant workers often face a different risk profile from local workers because recruitment, transport, visa status, housing, and language access can all affect their bargaining power.
In practice, teams look for controls around contract accuracy, fee prevention, document access, language support, dormitories, and safe complaint channels.
How this source informs this section
OECD Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible Business Conduct
OECD guidance treats migration context as a practical risk factor in labor rights, recruitment, and grievance access.
Why it matters
A program can look acceptable on paper and still miss severe risk if migrant workers are processed through labor agents, different contracts, or isolated housing arrangements.
This matters most when teams use the same review logic for every worker population and overlook where migration changes exposure.
How this source informs this section
H&M Group Guideline on Responsible Recruitment of Migrant Workers
H&M's recruitment guideline shows how migrant-worker risk becomes operational through contract terms, fee prevention, and labor-agent controls.
Nuance
Being a migrant worker is not itself a problem. The risk comes from the surrounding controls, for example whether workers understand the contract they signed or can leave employment safely.
Good migrant-worker controls usually sit inside responsible recruitment, grievance handling, and non-retaliation rather than in a standalone policy note.
How this source informs this section
H&M Group Guideline on Responsible Recruitment of Migrant Workers
The H&M guideline makes clear that the key issue is not migration itself, but whether the surrounding recruitment controls protect workers in practice.
Sources
OECD Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible Business Conduct
OECD · guidance
OECD's core guidance on how companies identify risk, prioritize, respond, track follow-up, and communicate what changed.
H&M Group Guideline on Responsible Recruitment of Migrant Workers
H&M Group · recruitment guideline PDF
H&M guideline on fee prevention, labor-agent control, migrant-worker protection, and contract integrity during recruitment.
