Seafood Task Force holds Indonesia Summit on Protecting Migrant Tuna Crews - May '25
The Seafood Task Force (STF) held a four-day summit from 28 April to 1 May 2025, in Indonesia, to discuss how to protect migrant fishers working on distant-water tuna vessels.
More than 50,000 Indonesians have left their homes to work on distant water vessels and they comprise 62% of all foreign migrant fishers in Taiwan, often enduring great hardship. Legislation to protect Indonesian migrant workers was enacted through Law No. 18 Year 2017 on the Protection of Indonesian Migrant Workers, however the implementation of the law has yet become effective, this was shown through the high number of unprocedural migration. Currently the law is going through the amendment process in the Parliament with the aim to enhance the protection of Indonesian Migrant workers and labour migration governance in Indonesia.
The summit, co-hosted by the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), brought together representatives from all parts of the tuna supply chain with unions, recruitment agencies, associations and government officials to understand the complexities of the issue and consider practical solutions.
The STF, which represents around 50 commercial members, has worked extensively across migration corridors into Thailand to identify gaps and continuously strives to ensure workers are recruited ethically and treated fairly, developing a Social Code of Conduct to support employment agencies to raise standards. This summit served as a significant milestone, marking the first official engagement with stakeholders in Indonesia, and as a continuation of the study of the post-covid recruitment landscape for Indonesian workers on Taiwanese distant-water vessels.
The summit provided an opportunity to hear first-hand accounts from migrant workers, including their access to grievance mechanisms and the challenges that the migrant fishers encounter when making complaints Delegates visited Pemalang, in Central Java, which sends around 3,000 Indonesian migrant fishers a year to various destinations in East Asia, to understand their experiences of recruitment and training. Most of the migrant fishers stated that one of the most pressing challenges they faces is the lack of transparency around additional cost related to recruitment fees.
Supavadee Chotikajan, Co-Chair of the SeaFood Task Force, told the conference:
“Our goal is to foster a collaborative platform for us to come together to make realistic improvements and to drive positive change. We do not come with pre-set solutions, but rather we are here to listen to you and understand your challenges so that we take back these insights to shape our workplan on responsible recruitment and on future pilot projects to represent workers’ voices."
The roundtable discussions focused on current efforts being made to promote responsible recruitment and the challenges of implementing local regulations whilst adhering to international standards. Meetings were held with representatives of the Ministry of Protection of Indonesian Migrant Workers, which is taking over all responsibility for migrant workers on distant-water vessels.
Martin Thurley, Executive Director of the Seafood Task Force, said:
“This was a listening exercise, which allowed us to understand the obstacles to reform and think about how we can support practical changes through a continuous improvement program for recruitment agencies. This will include educating them about regulatory compliance and educating vessels crews about their legal status.
In addition, Jeffrey Labovitz, Chief of Mission of IOM Indonesia said: "Our objective is clear and that is to illuminate both the gaps in the current system and the promising opportunities for developing transparent, robust, and ethical recruitment practices of Indonesian migrant fishers."
Furthermore, Yayan Hernuryadin, the Director of the Placement of Migrant Commercial Vessel Crew and Migrant Fishing Vessel Crew, Ministry of Protection of Indonesian Migrant Workers stated that “the highest placement of Indonesian migrant fishers is to Taiwan with 1.999 people last year. However, the high number of placements also comes with high number of complaints, several complaints were raised such as migrant fishers who experience exploitation, document withholding, forced labour, and human trafficking. Thus, conducting an evaluation of the current policy framework is urgent to address those challenges specifically through strengthening the regulation and monitoring, also to strengthen the multisectoral collaboration.”
There is a general acceptance that labour migration governance for migrant fishers need to be improved, and reporting mechanisms need to be enhanced, thus migrant fishers can formally complain about rights violations. We look forward to working with all stakeholders, including the government, to achieve tangible improvements in the coming years”.