The red tape faced by asylum-seekers trying to get work is off-putting for both employers and job-searchers, according to human rights groups.
The Irish Refugee Council and the Irish Council for Civil Liberties want a simplification of the procedures for asylum-seekers to secure work permits under a scheme brought in four months ago.
The director of the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, Mr Donncha O'Connell, said the current system was informed by "xenophobic and paranoid assumptions about asylum-seekers".
The latest Government figures show that just 31 of some 2,500 asylum-seekers currently eligible to work have been issued with work permits since the new rules were introduced last July.
About 30 other applications for work permits have either been refused or are currently being examined, according to the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment, which handles the asylum-seekers scheme.
Under the scheme, asylum-seekers in the State more than 12 months who had applied for asylum before last July were given the right to work while their applications to remain were being processed.
The decision followed a long-running internal Government dispute on the issue, with the Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue, and the Tanaiste, Ms Harney, publicly disagreeing on the issue.
Ms Harney's support for asylum-seekers' right to work was backed by the Minister of State, Ms Liz O'Donnell, who recently described the Government's refugee policy as a shambles.
Once an asylum-seeker applies for a job, the prospective employer must apply for a work permit on his or her behalf to the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment.
The process can take up to one month, and the employer is charged a sliding scale of fees, ranging from £25 for a one-month renewable permit to £125 for a permit for between five months and one year, the maximum allowed.
Employers must also show that they made reasonable efforts to fill the vacancy with someone who did not require a work permit, such as an Irish person or someone from the European Economic Area, which comprises the European Union and three other states.
A spokeswoman for the Irish Refugee Council, Ms Sarah MacNeice, said many employers interested in hiring asylum-seekers found the procedures very bureaucratic.
She said: "Generally, it has to be less bureaucratic and less restrictive. What it is now is the right to seek employment with the onus on the employer to go to the Department. There's a lot of red tape and it acts as a deterrent for both the employer and the asylum-seeker."
Mr O'Connell, from the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, said the "so-called right to work" was theoretical and illusory.
"If any philosophy underpins the system it is one informed by xenophobic and paranoid assumptions about asylum-seekers. Apart from the arguments based on justice, it is economically irrational to exclude an entire class of people from the labour market," he said.