The Swiss and U.S. governments have joined hands to initiate the Safe and Resilient Migrant Workers (SRMW) project in Sri Lanka. Designed to provide much needed guidance and skills development for Sri Lankan migrant workers, SRMW will be fully integrated with the U.S. Agency for International Development supported USD 18 million youth employment and entrepreneurship project, YouLead. The Swiss contribution of $1.5 million over three years will provide guidance and skills training for thousands of migrant workers, as well as helping returned migrant workers assess their skills learned overseas and link them to employment and entrepreneurship opportunities in Sri Lanka.
SRMW, part of SDC’s ‘Safe Labor Migration Program Phase IV’ was formally launched on March 2, 2021 at the Embassy of Switzerland in Colombo, by Ambassador Dr Dominik Furgler of Switzerland and Ambassador Alaina Teplitz of the United States.
The project is designed to make overseas employment safer and more rewarding, both financially and professionally, by providing better occupational information and by increasing the skill levels of Sri Lankans who go abroad for work. It will also work to help reintegrate returning workers into meaningful productive opportunities in Sri Lanka. SRMW comes at a particularly important time as more than 50,000 migrant workers are returning home due to the pandemic—many of them without employment prospects. The activity will focus its efforts in Kandy, Kurunegala, Anuradhapura, Puttalam and Vavuniya—all districts with large numbers seeking work overseas, while actively influencing national policy initiatives for improved skilled migration.
“The pandemic has undoubtedly highlighted the challenges faced by migrant workers for years, and this developing crisis calls for immediate action. Therefore, the ‘Skilled and Resilient Migrant Workers Project’ aims to build on the foundations laid by the safe labor migration programmes launched by the government of Switzerland, to accelerate its positive impact on Sri Lanka’s migrant labor force,” commented His Excellency the Swiss Ambassador to Sri Lanka, Dominik Furgler.
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