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For foreigners injured at the work site, too few options, too much fear

Published: 25 Sep. 2025, 07:00

LEE SOO-JUNG
[email protected]

Foreign laborers wearing traditional Vietnamese hats work on a potato farm in Gangwon on July 23. [YONHAP]

Mr. Han, a Chinese laborer, fractured his toe while working in Korea. What followed wasn't an apology from the employer but a yearlong legal battle for compensation for his injury.

In April 2024, just four days into his job at a honey farm in Hapcheon, South Gyeongsang, a stack of plastic pallets slipped from his hands and crushed his toes. It was not the kind of accident he was trained to avoid, Han recalled in an interview with the Korea JoongAng Daily at a cafe in Seoul on Sept. 9.

"All the employer taught me was how to open and close beehive frames," Han said. "No safety education or protective shoes were provided, and nowhere was the worksite perfectly safe."

Han was among 9,219 foreign laborers who suffered industrial accidents in Korea last year. The country itself has seen over 100,000 industrial accidents yearly since 2018.

President Lee Jae Myung, since taking office, has explicitly demanded better labor protections and enhanced state accountability, drawing from his experience as a teenager working in a factory, where his arm was injured on an assembly line. While likening deaths by industrial accidents to “murder by willful negligence,” Lee ordered governmental officials to directly notify him of such cases without any delay.

Han's injury at the honey farm was not his first industrial accident. While working at a waste-processing facility in Gangbuk District in northern Seoul several years ago, Han fell from a three-meter-high (9.8-feet-high) platform that was fixed improperly, resulting in broken ribs.

Korea has more than a million foreign nationals in the work force. But despite the rising number of foreign workers and industrial accidents involving them, they still are not afforded fair protection, and at times are given fewer guidelines and postaccident care, as was the case for Han.

Outsiders in Korean labor landscape

Filipino laborers, set to work in the agriculture industry, arrive in Yanggu County, Gangwon, in 2024. [YONHAP]

By Korean rulings, migrant workers — regardless of visa status — are eligible to receive compensation for workplace injuries. However, in practice, difficulties in navigating the Korean legal and social welfare systems often bar them from damage relief.

“The [state-run] Korea Workers' Compensation & Welfare Service can investigate industrial accidents and offer insurance coverage to the affected workers even if their workplaces are not insured under an industrial accident policy,” Yoon Jong-woo, a certified labor attorney, said. “Yet apart from legally available remedies, foreign laborers face difficulties due to their visa status, lack of knowledge of Korean labor policies and language barriers.”

Mr. Han looks out the window during an interview with the Korea JoongAng Daily in Guro District, western Seoul, on Sept. 9. [LEE SOO-JUNG]

Han's case exemplifies this.

Han, who has lived in Korea for nearly two decades, did not have any knowledge of how to receive compensation or seek damage relief for his work-related injury. Initially, his employer suggested a settlement of 500,000 won ($360) to cover three months of temporary disability benefits and medical bills. Han found the offer “unfair.”

Then, he sought assistance through the Seoul Foreign Resident Center — a welfare facility founded by the city to provide free legal consultations and run cultural programs for migrant adjustment. Labor attorneys from the center assessed Han’s damages and concluded that fair compensation would be 5.38 million won.

Despite legal advice and evidence from an MRI scan showing his fractured bones, the employer remained stingy, Han said. He did not relent and took legal steps against his employer. Earlier this year, the Seoul Southern District Court ruled in favor of Han.

After the verdict, the employer unilaterally wired him about 4 million won. “There was no prior notice about the remittance, but I just decided not to appeal.” Han’s case ended with him accepting the compensation — lower than what the court had ordered.

A group of Filipino laborers set to work as fishers in South Jeolla arrive at Incheon International Airport in 2022. [YONHAP]

Another labor attorney, Kwon Kyu-bo, told the paper that employers used to calculate compensation for industrial accidents based on the average income in migrant workers’ home countries, which are typically way below Korean wages.

“Recently, legal cases where more plaintiffs seek damage settlements based on Korea’s average wage are increasing,” Kwon said.

Repeating accidents and new measures

Industrial accidents involving foreign laborers in Korea [YUN YOUNG]

Korea — a country experiencing labor shortages in rural regions and a growing local reluctance to work in labor-intensive sectors — has grown dependent on a foreign work force. The country had 884,000 migrant workers in 2018, which increased to 1.01 million last year.

As the number of foreign laborers increased, so did workplace accidents involving them. According to the Ministry of Employment and Labor, 7,239 foreign workers experienced accidents at their worksites in 2018. Last year, the figure reached a record high of 9,219, accounting for 6.5 percent of all industrial accident victims nationwide.

On Aug. 4, a Burmese worker was rendered unconscious after being electrocuted while inspecting an underwater pump at a highway construction site in Gwangmyeong, Gyeonggi. A similar — this time fatal — accident followed just six days later. Two Southeast Asian workers died from electrocution at a shrimp farm in Goheung, South Jeolla. The two reportedly did not have safety gear.

President Lee Jae Myung, right, speaks about industrial accidents with entrepreneurs and workers during a discussion session held at a baking factory in Gyeonggi on July 25. [JOINT PRESS CORPS]

After a series of industrial accidents, President Lee said, "Outsourcing dangerous work to subcontractors is not desirable," calling out those who try to "profit without taking responsibility."

Despite the president's crackdown on industrial accidents and the irresponsible behavior of companies, industrial accidents involving foreign laborers continued in recent weeks. On Sept. 16, a Cambodian worker died after being caught in a press at a metal manufacturing plant in Incheon.

According to a set of labor policies to prevent occupational accidents unveiled on Sept. 15, the government said it would impose a hiring freeze on firms if foreign laborers died on the job. Injuries or diseases that occur at worksites can result in a one-year hiring suspension.

The Labor Ministry will appoint 200 experienced foreign workers as safety leaders nationwide next year to let them conduct safety training in their languages and mentor relatively unskilled foreign workers on safer work practices.

The Lee administration also pledged to reduce occupational fatalities to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development average by 2030 — 0.29 deaths per 10,000 workers, a tenth lower than Korea’s current figure of 0.39 deaths.

A reality check

Fire department officials conduct a safety inspection at greenhouses where foreign laborers work in Gyeonggi in January. [GYEONGGI-DO FIRE SERVICES]

While the presidential vows and policies appear to be inclusive, the reality inevitably places foreign laborers — both working illegally and legitimately — in a disadvantaged position due to fear of deportation and weak safety regulations according to labor attorneys.

Initially, Han — who holds a valid F-4 visa available for overseas Koreans — hesitated to report his injury to the Korea Workers' Compensation and Welfare Service, fearing it could expose foreign laborers working illegally at the honey farm. The service is a state-run agency that administers labor-related welfare policies and industrial and employment insurance.

Labor attorney Kwon noted that she had observed multiple cases in which foreign laborers who had overstayed paid their own medical bills for minor injuries that happened at workplaces without reporting them to state authorities. Seasonal workers are usually on E-8 visas, while most unskilled foreign workers hold E-9 visas, which allow them to stay in Korea for three years.

“The foreign workers who do not hold legitimate permits usually stay silent because they fear expulsions if they are caught,” Kwon said.

Gyeonggi police and immigration authority apprehend 13 illegal migrants near a grape farm in Pyeongtaek in 2024. [SON SUNG-BAE]

At the honey farm where Han worked, most of the employees were day laborers with little or no relevant experience. Although the Occupational Safety and Health Act mandates employers to provide at least an hour of safety training to day laborers whose contracts are shorter than a week, Han and his colleagues were never given such guidance.

“It was a new environment, where workers didn't know about the worksite’s landscape and how safety was supposed to be managed,” Han said.

Labor attorney Yoon noted that safety training should emphasize why workers should wear protective gear and follow safety rules — instead of unilaterally ordering them to follow the rules. “For example, for workers unfamiliar with wearing helmets, it is more effective to say that ‘wearing a helmet is necessary to protect your life,’” Yoon said.

The attorney also suggested that Korea benchmark the British system to raise safety awareness among laborers. He said that the British Construction Skills Certification Scheme is given to laborers who pass a health and safety exam by the Construction Industry Training Board, noting that the certificates work as an entry pass to worksites.

"Korea should also introduce a principle of banning entry of workers who did not undergo safety training in sectors with high industrial accident rates," Yoon said. "Mandatory education before entering a worksite will help establish a basic sense of safety among laborers."

BY LEE SOO-JUNG [[email protected]]