Vietnam Targets More Labor Markets This Year
Vietnam is attempting to expand its labor exports to other countries besides the four traditional markets of Taiwan, Malaysia, South Korea and Japan, said an official of the Ministry of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs with local newspapers last week.
“Promoting to open labor markets in the Middle East, Africa, some other countries in the Southeast Asia, North Europe and North America will be major tasks of this year’s activities,” said Head of Overseas Labor Management Department Nguyen Thanh Hoa.
Currently, nearly 150 Vietnam labor export businesses send most of their workers to Taiwan, Malaysia, South Korea and Japan.
As many as 80 per cent of the total 67,400 people that Vietnam exported to work abroad last year went to the four markets, Hoa said, adding that the respective figures were 90.3 per cent (or 28,000 people) and 31,000 in the first half of this year.
Vietnam is finding it difficult depending on only the four markets the official said. Labor export to Taiwan is an example, he added, explaining that Vietnam has posted a fewer number of guest workers since the foreign territory stopped importing nurses and housemaids from Vietnam.
"Vietnam will hardly hit the target of exporting 70,000 workers abroad this year if Taiwan keeps the barrier,” Hoa said.
Meanwhile, Vietnamese workers are getting reluctant to go to Malaysia although the foreign country is in serious need of workers, the official said. Low wages are attributed to the situation, he explained.
Expanding labor exports to new markets is, however, not easy for Vietnam, Hoa concerned.
Vietnamese workers were sent to the UK last year but the market has announced that it stopped receiving Vietnamese low-skilled workers due to the high rate of people breaking working contracts.
Other markets such as Saudi Arabia and Italy have not yet attracted Vietnamese employees. The Vietnamese are not interested in the former because of low salaries while the later has started exploring business opportunities with Vietnam after signing a labor cooperation agreement.
“Finding a new market is so hard because our partners know little about us,” Hoa sadly said.
Vietnam exported 31,000 workers in the first half of this year, a rise from the figure of 29,000 in the same period last year.
Taiwan was the largest market for Vietnamese workers employing 15,759 Vietnamese workers between January and June. Malaysia ranked second with 7,779. Followed by South Korea with 3,275, Japan with 1,769 and the UK with 66.
The number of Vietnamese workers fleeing their contracts has reached 45 per cent in some countries, particularly South Korea, Taiwan and Japan, leading to Vietnam’s permanent loss of these labor export deals for those markets.
Vietnamnet, Vnexpress
Vietnamese
