Hi there, I'm Ed Butler. Welcome to Business Daily on the BBC World Service.

Today, I'm in Southeast Asia, hearing from a few of the tens of millions of migrant workers

who keep the region's economies ticking.

Because with migrants, we have to be very careful at night because police might ask for money.

We are their ATM. They take all the money as much as they can.

It's a modern-day slavery, the exploitation on the foreign markets.

So what are companies and governments in Thailand and Malaysia doing to protect the rights of migrant workers?

We've really seen an increase in xenophobic rhetoric

that's really targeting a migrant community

that actually the economy is relying upon.

The migrant workers fueling Southeast Asia's economies.

That's Business Daily from the BBC.

So I'm standing now on the edge of the Moie River,

which is the river that divides Myanmar in Thailand.

And I'm looking across at Myanmar,

I can see groups of people walking over.

A young woman wearing a football shirt and a really heavy

looking rucksack on her back. Looks like she's coming for a big trip and you can hear in the

background some Myanmar pop music.

We're in the town of May Sott and alongside me gazing over the river and the road bridge that connects the two countries is Ii Nui.

She's an activist and former guerrilla fighter who, like some four million other compatriots, has now left their homeland to seek refuge and work in Thailand.

A collapsing economy and surging inflation in Myanmar,

...