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‘No way out’: the closing spaces for Rohingya livelihoods [1]

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Date: 2025-10 

Rohingya refugees are increasingly relying on informal work to survive on both sides of the Bangladesh-Myanmar border. Already tightly controlled, life both inside and outside refugee camps became more restricted after renewed fighting broke out between a rebel group and the Myanmar military in 2023. Now that US aid cuts have also come into force, the list of options for refugees in both countries has shrunk even further.

The economic crisis facing the Rohingya in Bangladesh and Myanmar is not just a result of poverty. It is a result of exclusion. In Bangladesh, refugees are banned from working formally and must rely on rations or precarious informal jobs. In Myanmar, livelihoods are disappearing under conflict, military restrictions, and growing distrust between ethnic groups.

Refugees are navigating the limited and precarious work opportunities available in both countries as best they can. Some jobs can still be found in sectors like small-scale farming and construction. A few have managed to open small businesses, while others have turned to family and friends abroad for help. Still others set their sights on migration, journeying to Thailand, Malaysia or other areas in Myanmar to try to find something better.

As a Rohingya and a research analyst, I have seen first-hand how exclusion from livelihoods has worsened poverty and despair. I have seen how Rohingya people try to survive by opening small tea stalls, used clothes shops or tuition centres in the camps, and how some must seek permission from armed groups just to fish or cultivate their land.

These daily struggles are not just about poverty. They are about exclusion from basic rights and opportunities. A political and sustainable solution is ultimately what is needed to end this cycle of displacement and precarity.

But in the meantime, small but crucial policy changes could drastically improve the lives of hundreds of thousands of displaced Rohingya on both sides of the border. These include: allowing supervised work opportunities for refugees in Bangladesh, brokering labour agreements with other countries to send Rohingya workers abroad, easing movement restrictions, continuing foreign aid, and supporting community-led initiatives.

Continuing conflict in Myanmar

The Rohingya people have faced marginalisation, violence and statelessness in Myanmar and Bangladesh for decades.

More than 1.3 million Rohingya refugees now live in camps in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, the majority having fled the Myanmar military’s assault on the Muslim Rohingya population that began in late 2016. Around 10,000 people were killed and villages were burnt to the ground in 2017.

Another 150,000 Rohingya people remain displaced inside Myanmar. Many live in the central Rakhine state, in overcrowded camps or urban areas under tight surveillance, without freedom of movement or formal access to jobs, education or healthcare.

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[1] Url: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-trafficking-and-slavery/no-way-out-the-closing-spaces-for-rohingya-livelihoods-bangladesh-myanmar/

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