PAXU® - Workers’ Well-being and Growth

Many impoverished low-skilled migrant workers, especially women, lack access to digital learning opportunities and reliable information, increasing their vulnerability to unscrupulous labor brokers and traffickers who promise them false jobs overseas. Due to lack of access, opportunity, and connectivity, these workers often endanger themselves by undertaking precarious journeys.

PAXU® is a mobile application that promotes safe migration and increases access to opportunities in the 21st century for migrant workers by enabling them to 1) calculate more secure economic futures, 2) acquire new skills for advancement such as English (our methods incorporate AI and eLearning), 3) build their digital literacy through microlearning, and 4) evaluate employers and service providers. By providing access to reliable information and digital upskilling opportunities, migrant workers can build resilience and improve their economic prospects through PAXU®. PAXU® can be localized with curated content for other geographies, communities, and demographics for migrants’ specific experiences and cultures.

Human trafficking is the second-largest criminal industry in the world, estimated at $150 billion per year (ILO 2012) - devastating over 40 million people, their families, communities, and businesses worldwide. 71% of victims are women and girls (ILO and Walk Free Foundation 2017).

PAXU® aims to safeguard low-skilled migrant workers from unsafe migration routes and getting ensnared in criminal trafficking networks. Globally, there are an estimated 164 million migrant workers (ILO 2018) on the move. In today’s globalized world, where fake news runs rampant on social media, disadvantaged workers lack reliable information about employment opportunities and remain disconnected from safe networks. Job seekers are also dangerously uninformed about recruitment fees, debt repayment, living costs abroad, and forced labor risks. Thus, when deciding to migrate, job seekers are unable to make adequate risk assessments, leading to unsafe situations. These situations can include huge amounts of debt, debt bondage, forced labor, sexual exploitation, and even death.

PAXU® is a mobile application designed to reduce low-skilled migrant workers, especially women’s, forced labor and trafficking risks, upskill (including learning English with AI) to enable participation in the digital economy, and address their unique challenges to create a safer, thriving world. By disseminating culturally appropriate and locally relevant information, workers can protect themselves from trafficking and strengthen their communities’ well-being by making informed migration choices. PAXU® enables access to vetted job opportunities and employer ratings to improve transparency for ethical recruitment and simplifies complex concepts (purchasing power parity, living cost comparisons, etc.) through four unique calculators for workers to make informed decisions about their futures. Phở Index® (purchasing power parity akin to the Big Mac Index) and Living Costs comparison calculators inform users of their migration decision. Job seekers can also calculate debt and broker fees repayment to prevent debt bondage.

Users can also access resources on COVID-19, unemployment, and finding jobs safely, in addition to topics on digital and financial literacy, trafficking and forced labor prevention, and safe migration. Thanks to technology and gamification, it is quicker and more cost-effective to connect with hard-to-reach migrant workers, especially in lower tiers of the supply chain.

Our target population is migrant workers, of which the most marginalized and vulnerable are women, ethnic minorities, low-skilled, and impoverished. In Vietnam, this includes job seekers living in industrial parks and the border regions in Vietnam, aged 18-40, who make 3-5 million VND/month (approximately 130-220 USD/month). Of this population, 70% are women. 

Informed by 20 years of women and youth empowerment in Vietnam, engaging 150,000+ at-risk community members, and training 52,000+ workers in the supply chain, PAXU® is based on a holistic, gamified, global community approach that meets cultural-specific, individual needs. Today’s free movement of trade with increased worker migration raises safety concerns while eroding brand reputation and consumer confidence.

PAXU® 1) reduces vulnerabilities by empowering migrant workers, especially women, with the knowledge, skills, and opportunities to reach their full potential through informed choices about their future and access to better, safer economic opportunities, 2) combating false information spread by traffickers by widening access to the latest vetted information, 3) microlearning focused on workforce readiness including English learning and digital literacy to upskill workers. Frequent input from users is solicited through surveys and focus groups to continually improve PAXU®.

Our problem, solution, and target population closely align with the Digital Workforce Challenge’s goals of creating a more inclusive digital economy for all. PAXU® enables and empowers low-skilled migrant workers, especially women, to participate in the digital economy through upskilling opportunities and equipping workers with relevant and culturally appropriate information to find safe job opportunities. We are committed to the growth and well-being of workers, especially those most vulnerable to forced labor and trafficking. PAXU® encompasses the Challenge’s educational aspects necessary to equip everyone with culturally relevant digital literacy skills to enable participation in the digital economy.

The Vietnamese are one of the top migrant groups in the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and the Netherlands. The Essex lorry deaths in October 2019 of 39 Vietnamese migrants brought worldwide attention to the precarious journeys vulnerable Vietnamese migrants take in search of a better life. It is estimated that 18,000 Vietnamese migrants risk their lives each year to be smuggled illegally into the UK. 

To expand to these locations, we will leverage our existing partnerships and capacity-building training program for frontline responders in these transit and destination countries. Next, we will leverage the same partnerships, to localize  PAXU® for other top migrant groups. Despite the Covid-19 pandemic, in 2020 alone, over 2.3 million people have immigrated to these countries.

PAXU® is available on the Google Play Store in Vietnamese and English. PAXU® was launched in June 2020 in Vietnam, a significant source country for trafficking victims. Destination and transit countries include the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and the Netherlands. To date, there are 15,000+ downloads. Approximately 244 million migrants worldwide (3.3% of the global population) (ILO 2017) migrate for better economic opportunities, facing modern slavery risks every day. PAXU® serves low-skilled migrant workers’ universal needs: informed decisions, finding safe jobs, upskilling, and more. PAXU® can be deployed progressively - for example continuing deployment beyond Vietnam by leveraging our existing partnerships along Vietnamese migrants’ journeys in transit and destination countries. Next, leveraging the same partnerships, to localize for other top migrant groups. During a USAID Asia CTIP Learning Session featuring PAXU® in February 2021, numerous international NGOs, funders requested its expansion into their countries. 

PAXU® is based on a holistic, gamified, global community approach that meets cultural-specific, individual needs. Today’s free movement of trade with increased worker migration raises safety concerns while eroding brand reputation and consumer confidence. PAXU® is a mobile application that helps migrant workers carefully consider their decision to migrate, digitizing crucial, complex information that migrant workers must understand when accessing job opportunities in a culturally relevant manner. We incentivize users to continue learning through gamification and integrate digital tools that have proven to be invaluable in increasing worker awareness and knowledge. Furthermore, with the proliferation of fake news, vulnerable workers must be safeguarded against misinformation.

PAXU® is the first comprehensive safe migration app of its kind that focuses on workers’ well-being and growth to improve users’ decision-making ability and workforce readiness skills to obtain better jobs while receiving up-to-date information to stay safe from forced labor and trafficking. The app brings a unique personalized experience to each user to make informed migration decisions while engaging key stakeholders across the public-private sectors for collaborations for more robust approaches to modern slavery prevention in the supply chain. PAXU® enables multinational businesses to comply with supply chain laws to prevent forced labor, protect brand reputation, and directly share safe job opportunities with migrant workers. Migrant workers can thrive in a safer world by building strong support networks through the PAXU® platform while learning about COVID-19, forced labor risks, and safe migration throughout their job search.

PAXU® is a mobile application that includes microlearning using artificial intelligence to provide personalized feedback to improve learning outcomes. We will crowdsource data from users to refine our Phở Index® and Living Costs comparison calculators with real-time information to inform the migration decision. The Phở Index® calculator helps users understand the purchasing power parity between different cities and countries. The Living Costs comparison calculator helps users compare the costs of living in different locations. Users input their scenarios in the calculators to receive personalized feedback and better understand the feasibility of living on their promised salaries. The calculators will determine if the promised opportunity is financially viable. If not, PAXU® will prompt users to reconsider their migration plans if it seems unsafe due to insufficient salary.

PAXU® has been piloted in Vietnam, with over 15,000 downloads and a 4.1 rating on the Google Play store. Through feedback collected from initial surveys, 76% of users use PAXU® every day for reliable information. 61% reported that they know how to calculate and have a reasonable debt repayment plan and save money. 50% regularly tracked their daily spendings and have improved their budgeting. 

A PAXU® user shared, “I have been learning and equipped with a lot of knowledge to apply to my life. I know how to manage my family’s expenses better and save for the future to prevent debt bondage.” 

Factory workers, especially those from rural areas, can struggle to obtain trustworthy information. H, a regular user of PAXU,® credits the app with providing her information about how she can identify and better protect herself from exploitative situations such as forced labor and illegal recruitment practices. She shared that, from now on, when looking for a new job, she made sure to consider and compare the living costs between locations because it could significantly affect her take-home salary. H. also introduced PAXU® to friends and family, especially those whom she knew was looking for jobs abroad but likely did not know about the risks. 

Another user, T., shared,  “I was so excited about the job opportunity that I ignored the potential risks. PAXU® helped me better evaluate it and I decided not to go. It takes courage to make tough decisions and I think I was brave not to take the job.”

A demo is available at http://pacf.us/PAXUdemo21. 

PAXU® introduces potential privacy and security risks, especially as the solution continues to scale. To mitigate these risks, we will work closely with our app developer to ensure that breaches and bugs are promptly addressed so that our users’ data remains protected and confidential and the app can continue to function. Any collected data, including through our surveys, is made anonymous when possible. Pacific Links Foundation has a safeguarding policy and training in place for employees, volunteers, contractors, and other associates to protect our beneficiaries. We will also make backup versions available to ensure the security of our users’ data.

PAXU® currently serves 15,000+ users. In one year, PAXU® can serve 50,000+ users. In five years, PAXU® can serve 300,000+ users. 

In the first year, our focus will be on refining the solution to better serve the existing population of Vietnamese migrant workers in Vietnam and abroad. Common destination and transit countries for Vietnamese migrant workers and potential victims of trafficking include the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and the Netherlands. We will leverage our existing programs and partnerships with the public and private sectors to increase app adoption. This includes our capacity-building training program for frontline responders in destination and transit countries, and research, Precarious Journeys, mapping the vulnerabilities of victims of trafficking from Vietnam to Europe, in partnership with ECPAT UK and Anti-Slavery International (published in 2019). In the future, PAXU® can be expanded to destination and transit countries for Vietnamese migrants, then localized for additional migrant groups in Vietnam and eventually expanded globally, starting with countries where already have strong partnerships such as the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and the Netherlands.

Our impact goals include ending trafficking and forced labor through education for vulnerable, low-skilled migrant workers, specifically through increasing:

• The number of people with relevant skills for workforce readiness, advancement, and financial success, especially in information and communications technology

• Education and training opportunities

• Opportunities designed especially for women and girls 

PAXU® was designed to give disadvantaged migrant workers, opportunities to build the skills needed to access digital tools for upskilling and improved economic opportunities. 

We will continue to leverage our existing programs and partnerships, especially our trafficking awareness, skill-building, and leadership training program for factory workers and migrant workers at the grassroots levels, and capacity-building program with frontline responders to scale deployment to our target users. To further the impact, we will expand partnerships with the private and public sector including services for migrant workers to bring PAXU® throughout Vietnam and replicate our solution in other countries like the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and the Netherlands. We will also build a community around PAXU® starting with a Facebook group to introduce PAXU® to cultivate potential users, use social media ads to promote PAXU®, and deploy outreach and media campaigns to increase app adoption.

Pacific Links Foundation advocates for disadvantaged migrant workers, especially women, through capacity building, to unlock their self-confidence and economic potential. We will measure the impact of our project through focus groups, interviews, pre-and post-evaluation, and surveys. 

We expect: 

• Increase in workforce readiness skills by 90% 

• Access to safer, better economic opportunities 

• Creation of community and support network for migrant workers

These numbers are projected based on our current results from PAXU® and other initiatives within our portfolios. 

Indicators include:   

• Number of downloads 

• User retention rate

• Number of users trained in workforce readiness skills

• Number of users using the migration decision calculators 

• Percentage of users using PAXU® to access news

Part-time staff: 6 

Volunteers: 2

Contractors: 2

Pacific Links Foundation has 20+ years of experience empowering women and youth in a culturally competent context. Over the years, we have built a vast collaborative network engaging many other trusted NGOs, multinationals (Intel, Walmart, Clarks Shoes, LBrands, Abercrombie & Fitch, etc.), international foundations (Walmart Foundation, Rotary, etc.), and governments that speak to the trust in our programs. Our direct grassroots experience in Vietnam working with over 150,000 disadvantaged youth - many of whom are migrant workers - brings a first-hand understanding of what is needed most.

Our solutions are informed by our beneficiaries as well as stakeholders (brands, factories, local governmental partners, etc.) to give voice and bring diverse perspectives to address their unique needs. 

We already have valuable databases through 20+ years of field expertise, cultural competency, tailored content, and access venues to reach the target population. All will ensure successful deliverables to enrich PAXU content and accelerate delivery to a wider audience globally, catered to local needs while addressing today’s global challenges.

We believe that it is important to have a leadership team that represents diverse backgrounds, perspectives, and skills including those from similar communities that we serve and those who have overcome similar hardships. 

Led by women in nonprofit, business, and legal sectors, our team collectively has 150+ years of expertise to solve the global challenges disadvantaged youth, especially women and girls face to advance their standing in society. Furthermore, our team consists of former refugees who understand the vulnerabilities migrants face.  

Pacific Links Foundation collectively brings decades of experience in women’s empowerment, youth development, poverty alleviation, counter-trafficking, and social work. 

The funding grant of $100,000 from the challenge will be used to 1) increase app adoption and retention, especially in new markets where Vietnamese workers migrate to such as the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and the Netherlands, 2) upkeep the app, 3) improve user onboarding and content quality, 4) develop a network of volunteer specialists to combat disinformation from bots, trolls, traffickers, etc. and 5) expand and develop partnerships for additional funding opportunities. The publicity generated as a selected Fellow will also enable us to leverage the Solve network to build partnerships to continue the much-needed expansion of PAXU.

The following support is especially needed to scale PAXU®: 

• A business model including strategy and development of a business plan 

• Financial to develop a pitch to potential investors 

• Public Relations to develop a branding/marketing strategy, social and global media presences to attract new PAXU® users 

• Monitoring & Evaluation to fully capture our impact 

• Service Distribution to expand our client base and develop partnerships with retailers and brands to deploy PAXU®

• Technology to further develop PAXU® including localization, optimization according to market conditions and user feedback, and new features

We are looking to partner with organizations that can:

• Integrate existing AI learning tools, especially for English 

• Connect existing Workforce Readiness solutions and services for migrant workers (banks, housing, etc.) to PAXU®  

• Further support the development of PAXU® such as MIT faculty, Microsoft, Amazon, Google, The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, The Geneva Learning Foundation