Pursuant to the directive of the President to strengthen security measures for all OFWs in war torn or high risk countries and consistent with the One Country Team Approach, the following operational guidelines are hereby issued:

1. The Philippine Overseas Employment Administration shall immediately provide all Philippine Overseas Labor Offices (POLOs) with an updated monthly registry of employers/companies, complete with their addresses and contact numbers;

2. The said registry shall likewise contain the list of names of workers employed by the employer/company including the skills/positions;

3. The POLO shall require the employer to submit the name and contact number of responsible officer/staff with whom it shall deal on matters of security and monitoring of deployed workers.  The POLO shall likewise identify a coordinator from among the Filipino employees in the company for the same purpose;

4. Once the focal persons are identified, the POLO shall immediately conduct an orientation training on matters relating to coordination and assistance and to forge a realistic security plan;

5. A DOLE Crisis Management Committee is hereby created to be headed by the Undersecretary for Employment Promotion and Manpower Development with the Administrators of POEA and OWWA and Director, ILAS, as members.

6. In close coordination with the Head of Mission, the POLO shall submit incident reports and such other relevant information as soon as they become available to the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) Crisis Management Committee.

7. The International Labor Affairs Service (ILAS) shall immediately furnish all POLOs with contact numbers and e-mail addresses of the members of the DOLE Crisis Management Committee.

FOR STRICT COMPLIANCE.

Adopted: 20 July 2004


(SGD.) PATRICIA A. STO. TOMAS
Secretary