Hanoi (VNA) – Across ASEAN member states such as Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam, millions of people are participating in a quiet economic shift, through taking small, paid digital tasks.
Those tasks, from data annotation and image tagging, are creating a rise of micro-digital income - a new layer of household resilience taking shape across Southeast Asia.
In the context of Southeast Asia’s Internet economy surpassing the 300 billion USD mark, the trend is gaining strong momentum. In the Philippines, the cultural concept of “diskarte” – resourcefulness – has taken a digital form. In Vietnam, rapid e-commerce growth has expanded opportunities for home-based digital work. In Indonesia, a hub for data annotation, the trend has also surfaced, tapping a young workforce for flexible, task-based roles. World Bank research estimates that between 154 million and 435 million people engage in online gig work worldwide, underscoring how digital, task-based income is reshaping labour markets far beyond Southeast Asia.
For most participants, however, micro-digital work functions as a flexible, part-time layer woven into daily life, completed during commutes, breaks or in the evenings. Engagement typically ranges from one to three hours on weekdays, with many users rotating across multiple platforms to find suitable tasks and better rates.
The income is supplementary. For younger participants, it often covers digital costs such as mobile data or streaming subscriptions. Older users use their earnings for household expenses or discretionary spending. More significantly, households are adopting a blended “portfolio” strategy that combines formal employment, informal gigs and micro-digital tasks.
Observers argue that rather than merely encouraging participation, governments and businesses need to establish a fair micro-work standard. This will include transparent remuneration, clear task guidelines, and defined pathways for skills upgrading for workers. Such an approach is seen as a win–win strategy: companies gain access to a vast labour pool, while workers secure a more sustainable and equitable source of income./.
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