Promoting Safe and Skilled Labour Migration: Implementation and Challenges in Indonesia's Labour Migration Policies

ABSTRACT This study used an interpretive research method to assess the effectiveness of policy reforms in ensuring safe migrant labour from Indonesia, a major sender of low‐skilled workers. The findings indicate that inadequate implementation infrastructure can exacerbate human rights abuses rather than prevent them. While the central government emphasises official protection mechanisms, local governments lack physical and human resources for effective implementation. Furthermore, structural dependence on market‐savvy sending agencies has emerged. The study suggests that Indonesia's labour migration policy needs to shift from a framework of detailed regulations to a flexible mechanism more in line with implementation capacity and market realities and recommends the establishment of public support centres, the standardisation of cost structures, the expansion of skills certification systems, and the strengthening of public‐private partnerships.