Climate Change, Vulnerability and Migration

Southeast Asia has made significant progress on human development in recent decades, but large gaps and disparities remain, both within and across countries.

There continue to be large differences in social and physical infrastructure, education and health care, and the availability of job opportunities beyond agriculture. For example, gross domestic product (GDP) per capita in 2023 was just US$1,875 in Cambodia and $2,075 in Lao PDR, compared with $4,347 in Viet Nam and $7,172 in Thailand.

Cambodia, Lao PDR and Viet Nam all have mostly-rural populations; economies in which informal employment prevails; and exposure to a wide range of climate hazards, with frequent disasters. Climate change is hindering development, amplifying disparities and pushing people deeper into poverty.

Cambodia, where as of 2022, 30.5% of the population was younger than 15 years old, has made major progress on poverty reduction. In 2014, more than two in five children lived in multidimensional poverty, and by 2022, the share was one in five (20.5%). Notably, given how many children of migrants stay behind with their grandparents, Cambodia has some of the highest disability rates in the world, reaching 57% among those aged 60 and older.

Cambodia has prioritized adaptation to climate change, recognizing its many vulnerabilities, and paid special attention to the needs of children, women, ethnic minorities and other marginalized groups. It has also sought to protect migrant youth in the workplace. However, it has not explicitly addressed links between climate change and migration in its policies and planning, or the implications for children.

Lao PDR is even younger than Cambodia – 31% of its population is under 15 years old – and very ethnically diverse, with more than 49 officially recognized ethnic groups. Agriculture accounts for an estimated 70% of employment, and as of 2023, an estimated 7.6% of employed people 15 and older lived on less than US$2.15 per day. Lack of education is a key factor: just under 19% of women aged 25 and older, and just over 30% of men over 25, had any secondary education at all as of 2022.

Lao PDR’s climate plans and policies have not significantly addressed gender disparities or the specific needs of children and youth, and do not address links to migration. However, other policy instruments have sought to promote gender equality and protect children. Policies to protect labour migrants have focused on adults, while efforts around child migrants have mainly focused on preventing trafficking.

Viet Nam is well ahead of Cambodia and Lao PDR in terms of economic growth and diversification. Its GDP has more than quadrupled since 2000, the extreme poverty rate dropped from nearly 30% to 1%, dependence on agriculture has declined significantly, and human development has greatly improved. Still, there are large regional disparities, and internal migration has soared, particularly towards the southeast.

Of the three countries profiled, Viet Nam is ahead of its neighbours in advancing child protection, including around disaster risks and pollution. This country also faces the most daunting climate hazards, including extreme heat and major flood risks linked to sea-level rise and coastal storms, which have led the World Bank to identify northern Viet Nam as a likely climate out-migration “hotspot” by 2050.

Notably, in all three countries, development has improved conditions – for instance, by making irrigation more widely available, adding roads and expanding electricity access – but also created new vulnerabilities.

It is common for projects to result in significant displacement, and major infrastructure projects have also affected flood risks and other conditions in surrounding communities.

Economic precarity, environmental pressures and mobility.

Our field research focused on two villages in one district in each country. The sites were chosen to reflect not a cross-section of society, but the perspectives of those in the greatest need of support to cope with climate change.

Champasack province, in southwestern Lao PDR, borders both Thailand and Cambodia. Soukhuma district is in a floodplain at the Thai-Lao border and is overwhelmingly rural. More than a fifth of residents lack a road connection, so they cannot readily travel to school or to jobs outside their villages. Access to basic services is minimal, and across Champasack province, only about a quarter of all people over the age of 6 have completed even primary school.

The first village, L1, is in a low-lying area next to a river, highly exposed to floods. There is no bridge, and when the waters rise, people cannot travel by boat, and the village is isolated. Residents are part of the Suay ethnic minority and mostly poor farmers. Floods often damage or destroy crops, and in 2019, the flooding was so severe that villagers were temporarily displaced. The poorest people are particularly vulnerable to the impacts of floods.

“There was not enough fish to eat. We drank rainwater. We could not help others; we had to help ourselves first. Other families got sick; luckily our family did not. We stopped school for almost two months, because the school was also flooded, the building damaged, school materials destroyed.”

^{- An 18-year-old, very poor girl described the aftermath of a large flood}

The residents of the second village, L2, are also farmers, growing crops such as cassava and vegetables and fishing. Floods are not frequent there, but there are droughts, and conditions are hot and dry, made worse by climate change and deforestation. Storms and strong winds also often damage homes.

In village L1, many impoverished residents migrate to Thailand after hearing about job opportunities. Most migration from L2 is long-term, mainly to Thailand, for everything from domestic work to construction jobs. The households that have not resorted to migration usually own land and are relatively wealthy.

Thuong Xuan is a mountainous district in Thanh Hoa province, in north central Viet Nam, that borders Lao PDR. Much of the district has no significant roads and is very rural and remote. It is also one of the poorest in Viet Nam, with about a quarter of households living in poverty as of 2019.

Thanh Hoa as a whole has a tropical monsoonal climate, and its coastline is frequently struck by tropical storms and typhoons. Thuong Xuan district is inland, but still experiences heavy rains, floods and landslides. It is also the site of the Cua Dat project, Viet Nam’s largest hydropower and irrigation dam, on the Chu River. The combination of heavy rains and increased reservoir water levels has led to severe floods and loss of arable land, jeopardizing livelihoods. Amid economic struggles, many people have migrated. Viet Nam has high rates of internal mobility, and Thuong Xuan district is just about 200 km from Hanoi.

About 30% of households in the first village, V1, are part of the Thai ethnic minority, and the rest are mainly Kinh, the largest ethnic group in Viet Nam. They grow rice, acacia and vegetables and tend to buffalo. The village lies next to a river, and when water levels are high due to heavy rains and/or dam discharges, it is unsafe to cross, so no one can leave, and children cannot attend school.

_{A 40-year-old man explained:}

“It’s an isolated village. Children can miss school for very long periods. If you have relatives on the other side of the river, you will not miss school in the rainy season, but if you do not, you will have to miss school. The education of the children of this village is mostly inferior to that of other children in the area.”

Since the dam was built, the availability of irrigation has shielded local farmers from the impacts of droughts, but flood risks have worsened. A growing number of people in the village have thus migrated internally for factory work.

The people in the second village, V2, are better-off overall than those in V1, and they have greater access to off-farm job opportunities, such as factory work. In a fairly rural region with large ethnic minority populations, V2 also stands out for being about 95% Kinh and heavily urbanized.

Parents in the six villages migrated under different circumstances, but all were looking to earn more money than they could in their community.

Why are they migrating? Distress migration was very common. Some migrants were struggling to feed their family due to low crop yields, crop failures, and/or a lack of stable work. Some parents viewed migration as a long-term investment in their children’s future. Other economically insecure households often needed to sell their land in order to pay off debts and even cover the costs of migration.

Journeys, destinations and outcomes

Thailand is the wealthiest and most developed country in the Greater Mekong Subregion, and thus a top destination for labour migrants, with average wages that are double those in Cambodia and Lao PDR. However, regular migration is not always affordable or feasible. For long-term, low-wage work, migrants from Cambodia and Lao PDR must follow a process laid out in memoranda of understanding (MOUs) with their respective governments. Permits are good for two years and can be renewed once. For short-term work, such as seasonal farm labour, migrants can obtain temporary non-citizen cards known as “pink cards”; Cambodians are also eligible for 90-day border passes, usable only in border areas.

These options are meant to provide a safe, regular channel for workers to enter Thailand, but there are significant restrictions. They are tied to a specific employer, for instance, and usually must stay in a single province. This limits workers’ ability to rotate across multiple plantations or construction sites.

For parents, a key issue with both the MOU and short-term pass systems is that migrants are not allowed to bring their dependents. This means if they migrate regularly, they must leave their children behind.

Alternatively, they can migrate through irregular channels, which can be dangerous. Irregular migrants also remain vulnerable at their destination and must hide from the authorities.

A 35-year-old Laotian mother of three said she migrated to Bangkok to work in construction because her mother had a brain tumour, and she wanted to earn money to help her. However, upon arrival, she got separated from her cousins who were migrating with her. Tragically, she never saw them again and did not make it home before her moth passed. Instead, she was confined to the premises – an aspect of forced labour – and did not even earn what she had expected:

“They didn’t pay me on time, and even when they did, it was only a partial amount, [and] they provided limited funds for our basic needs.”

Impacts on chidren remaning behind

Migrant parents, whether they stayed in their country or crossed the border, found the financial benefits fell short of their expectations. Often they could not send as much money as they wished – or send it consistently. Remittances might just cover debt payments or basic expenses, and did not significantly improve their family’s socio-economic situation or enhance their resilience to climate change.

A 47-year-old Cambodian mother who had migrated to Thailand with her husband recalled how the exploitative work conditions made it impossible to send money home:

“It was just enough for us to eat, and we didn’t have money left. I started to think with my husband: ‘If we keep doing this, we won’t have any profit left.’ I had been working for one year, and I didn’t have any money left when I returned home.”

The economic gains from remittances also came at a high cost. When parents left, the lives of those who stayed behind were often dramatically altered. The interviews revealed profound emotional impacts on children, particularly when their mother migrated. Caregivers were often overwhelmed, and some grandparents felt that they could not provide the support children needed. Many households struggled financially, and some children did not have enough to eat. In some cases, the absence of parents was associated with worse educational outcomes and school dropouts.

However, many parents and caregivers also made it a priority for the children to get their education. A 16-year-old Cambodian girl whose parents migrated to Thailand said she studied hard:

“They’re always calling and motivating me, pushing me to study harder. They also told me: ‘You don’t have to worry about us; we’ll keep working hard as long as you want to study.’ They want me to graduate and be successful. They told me to become a doctor or a teacher.”

At the same time, the emotional toll of parents’ absence came through in many interviews. An 18-year-old son of very poor migrants said:

“I worry about how they live, how they survive. They are alone. Sometimes they call and they cry. They do not have smartphones, though, so they cannot video-call.”

Every year in Southeast Asia, countless families choose to migrate with their children, and many children also migrate on their own.

There were about 1.27 million international child migrants in the region as of 2020 – about 40% in Thailand. However, given the high prevalence of irregular migration, the number of migrant children in Thailand living without domestic legal status has been estimated at 1 million to 2.5 million.

Child migrants

Children interviewed for this study said they had migrated for a variety of reasons, such as to pay off household debts, cover their siblings’ school fees, cover medical expenses, and generally help improve their family’s situation. Each story was different, but in all six villages, the drivers were closely linked to the broader socio-economic context and the impacts of climate and environmental changes.

For example, a 13-year-old girl from Cambodia with three younger siblings who now lives with her grandparents said she migrated to Phnom Penh when she was 10, with her mother and siblings. They all went together, and she worked. She explained that they had migrated because:

“My family is poor and is short of many things, and there was flooding as well. My grandpa and grandma are also sick, so my mom decided to take me to work so that we can have money to support the family.”

Boys were particularly likely to express a desire to help provide for their families and repay debts. As a mother in Viet Nam explained, her son dropped out of school in ninth grade after his family took on debt to care for his grandfather’s hospital and medical bills. When the boy saw the mounting medical bills – 100 million dong (US$3,948) – he decided to go away to work for three years. He went to Binh Duong to work in a restaurant and sent 2–3 million dong (US$79–118) each month. He said he was often fatigued, but refused to come back. “Going far away is difficult, so difficult,” the mother said and continued to say:

“He is still too young to have to endure such pressures. … I want my child’s future to be better and less difficult. … I pray that my son will not encounter thieves, robbers, snatchers or many social evils.”

Children's journeys and destinations

Most of the interviewees who had migrated as children had travelled with one or both of their parents, though several had gone by themselves. Their journeys typically followed commonly used pathways, often involving significant risks. Only one child migrant described having been trafficked, though this may have been a matter of perspective, as brokers and smugglers were usually involved.

For children as for adults, internal migration tends to be easier and less risky than cross-border migration, though young migrants are still highly susceptible to exploitation and abuse.

Lack of legal status often keeps migrant children in Thailand from accessing education or health care. Thailand allows children of irregular migrants to obtain a non-Thai identity card, and even without one, they may attend public school, but many migrants are unaware of this, or else afraid to reveal their status to the authorities. Schools are also not equipped to teach children who do not speak Thai.

More commonly, children who migrate with their parents work alongside them. Informal employment predominates across the region, and migrants are particularly likely to be informally employed. Several child migrants in the villages had worked on plantations and on construction sites; some had done domestic labour, or worked in factories and in service jobs. Like migrant parents, child migrants often said they had been exploited, forced to work long hours, and sometimes cheated out of their wages. While some had accomplished their objective, many had returned home determined not to migrate again.

A 16-year-old girl from Cambodia said she had migrated alone to work in a casino in Preah Sihanouk. Asked whether she was afraid, she replied:

“Yes, sometimes I felt scared, but I didn’t have any choice.”

She paid about US$100 for a room and earned around US$300 per month working 12–18 hours per day. After covering her expenses, she was able send around US$100 per month to her family. The girl also noted that her employment at the casino had been illegal, and that returning there would be difficult.

Although most migrants interviewed in Viet Nam had stayed in the country, a 17-year-old boy from a very poor and landless household described being misled by traffickers who took him to Cambodia:

“I went to the South to work with my friends... My parents didn’t know what it was like to go south to work.”

When he reached his destination, he realized he had been tricked and was in Cambodia. His parents had to borrow 100 million dong (about US$3,928) to get him back home.

Impact of child migration on development and well-being

Given the challenges of child migration, with or without parents, children in the households interviewed had generally only migrated if their family faced a very difficult situation. Many children had already been working outside of school hours, and some had dropped out even before migrating. Still, migration often imposed further deprivations and stressors that affected their health and well-being.

A girl from Lao PDR who migrated in preadolescence described her loneliness and isolation after migrating with her older sister:

“In Thailand, I only had two or three friends, and I felt very homesick. I missed my parents very much.” She also missed school for two years before returning home. “Now, I am back in school. I do not want to go back to Thailand. We now have enough food with support from my sister who migrated. My brothers have not yet sent back money home.”

Cross-border migration was often, but not always, associated with dropping out of school, while internal migration more commonly resulted in missed weeks or months, with children more easily returning to school afterward. Some child migrants only migrated during school breaks, though they often stayed for at least some time beyond the break.

For example, a woman from Cambodia said she and her school-age daughter went to Thailand to work on plantations whenever there was work available: “She always misses school. She might go to school for two or three months, then we need to go to Thailand, and another two or three months later, we need to go to Thailand again. If it is the season to pick longan, then we need to go.”

Several children who had migrated described getting sick or being injured on the job, and not all had access to health care services – or if they did, some had to pay high fees.

Some said they had felt isolated and sad, and missed their loved ones. The emotional impacts of these experiences can be severe and long- lasting. Moreover, the disruption of their education, exposure to hazardous working conditions and other factors could have long-term consequences for children’s personal development and future opportunities.

Child migrants' own aspirations

While families’ economic distress, exacerbated by climate and environmental change, was clearly a key driver of child migration, it is important to recognize children’s own perspectives, including their hopes and aspirations.

The child migrants interviewed said they had made the decision to migrate because they wanted to achieve better socio-economic conditions. At the same time, children recognized that migration was not the best pathway out of poverty, even if it was their only option at the time. They were aware of the precarity of the journeys and the exploitative conditions that were common at their destination. As a result, if they were able to stay with their family, many chose to do so, even if they could earn more by migrating.

Asked why she did not want to migrate to work in construction like many others in her community, a 12-year-old Cambodian girl replied:

“Because it’s hard. I want to keep studying.”

Parents’ and siblings’ migration can also enable some children to dream bigger. A 16-year-old girl in Viet Nam whose mother migrated to Hanoi to be a domestic worker was still enrolled in school when she was interviewed. Asked whether she wished to migrate, she said:

“In the future, I would want to study abroad in South Korea, since this is an expanding market. You can go to know more and learn more.”