An expanding labour market brings hope

It is encouraging to learn that Bangladesh's labour market is expanding beyond the Gulf and Southeast Asian countries. According to a report by this daily, our workers are now increasingly migrating to other destinations such as South Korea, Italy and Japan. That said, Saudi Arabia still remains the biggest employer of Bangladeshi labour force, with 54 percent of migrant workers going to the country in 2022. After Saudi Arabia, Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Singapore, Malaysia, Qatar and Kuwait are among other top employers. However, South Korea has now emerged as a promising destination, having recruited some 9,170 workers between January 2022 and June 2023.

In addition, Japan, Italy and Seychelles are also increasingly attracting migrants. While Italy lifted an eight-year embargo on hiring workers from Bangladesh in October 2020, Japan recently made arrangements with Bangladesh to recruit new workers. Seychelles, on the other hand, is also recruiting workers after an agreement on labour cooperation in 2019.

The expansion beyond the Gulf has been long overdue because Middle Eastern countries mostly recruit unskilled or low-skilled workers from Bangladesh, who receive a lower salary compared to skilled workers from the Philippines, India or China. This is also one of the reasons for our declining remittance inflow, even though we have been sending an increasing number of workers to these countries. Moreover, our workers are often exposed to violence and abuse in the Gulf countries. A staggering number of them, including female workers, died in these countries having faced appalling living and working conditions as well as abuse by employers. Therefore, it is crucial that we reduce our overdependence on Gulf countries and find alternative destinations.

Although the number of workers sent to the emerging destinations is still very low, we hope that it will continue to rise, and the addition of skilled labour should also create a competitive and conducive environment in the labour-receiving countries. This will also increase our bargaining capacity as a labour-sending country, and in turn help our workers get better salaries as well as protection from abuse. Right now, the priority is to keep up the momentum. Meanwhile, the expatriate ministry should focus more on upskilling workers so that they can bring in better economic returns. Moreover, private recruiting agencies should also be involved in the process to increase outflow of workers and explore new markets for them.