HomeNet Thailand

HomeNet Thailand was founded in 1999 as an NGO to support home-based workers across Thailand. Today, HomeNet Thailand consists of:

• HomeNet Thailand Association, a membership-based organization (MBO) composed primarily of home-based workers with 5,000 members across Thailand
• the Foundation for Labour and Employment Promotion (FLEP), an NGO which provides technical support to HomeNet Association and other MBOs in Thailand.

HomeNet Thailand’s key struggles and victories over the last two decades include the fight for Thailand’s universal health care system (2002), the Homeworker Protection Act (2010), Ministerial Regulations on Domestic Workers (2012), and Thailand’s voluntary social society scheme (2014).

A Growing Multi-Sector Federation

In 2016, HomeNet Thailand helped to establish the Federation of Informal Workers of Thailand (FIT), which now represents over 23,000 workers. Initially, FIT brought together the first four membership-based organizations listed, and others subsequently joined:

• HomeNet Thailand Association (registered 2013; 4,618 members in 2019)
• Association of Motorcycle Taxi Drivers of Thailand (established 2010, 6,400 members in 2019)
• Network of Domestic Workers in Thailand (established 2012, 591 members including Thai and Burmese workers)
• Muubaan Nakila Service Cooperative (established in 2008, representing 200+ market vendors in Muubaan Nakila Housing Estate)
• Network of Thai Street Vendors for Sustainable Development (11,491 members)

The Network of Thai Street Vendors formed in 2017 to fight the Bangkok Metropolitan Authority’s removal of vendors from the city’s streets. See the 2017 update to Vending in Public Space: The Case of Bangkok (WIEGO Policy Brief No. 16).

1-minute Video:  Poonsap Tulaphan, a HomeNet Thailand leader, explains how her organization empowers homeworkers through policy advocacy and legal protection, skill-building, and negotiating with employers.

Publications & Resources

• Informal Workers in Bangkok, Thailand: Scan of Four Occupational Sectors (also in Thai) (2017)
• Considerations for Policy Makers (2017, WIEGO and HomeNet Thailand)
• Street Vending for Sustainable Urban Development in Bangkok - A 2017 policy brief developed by the Network of Thai Vendors for Sustainable Development in concert with WIEGO and HomeNet Thailand.
• Informal Economy Monitoring Study: Home-based Workers in Bangkok
• VIDEO: Suntaree Saeng-Ging of HomeNet Thailand Speaks During Worker's Group Meeting at the 2016 International Labour Conference