Overseas Employment: Highest number since 2008

Although overseas employment for Bangladeshi workers has increased significantly this year, their safety, security, health and wages issues still remain a concern for migrant rights activists.

Around 7.2 lakh Bangladeshi workers landed jobs abroad between January and mid-December, officials at the expatriates welfare ministry said yesterday.

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This is the highest figure since 2008 when overseas employment peaked at over 8.75 lakh. Last year, the figure was 5.5 lakh, according to statistics of the Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training.

Expatriates Welfare Minister Nurul Islam and ministry officials expressed satisfaction over this year's overseas employment figure. However, migrant rights activists were unhappy about workers' protection.

“I can happily say that a total of 7.22 lakh Bangladeshis have taken jobs abroad this year so far. We hope the figure would be more than 7.5 lakh at the end of this year,” the minister told reporters at a press conference in the city's Probashi Kalyan Bhaban.

The briefing was organised marking the International Migrants Day which will be observed today.

Expatriates Welfare Secretary Begum Shamsun Nahar said the government received complaints from Bangladesh missions in some countries about some recruiting agencies' involvement in collecting fake job demand letters.

She, however, did not disclose the names the accused recruiting agencies.

Tasneem Siddiqui, founder chair of the Refugee and Migratory Movements Research Unit, lauded sending huge number of workers abroad. She lamented the lack of measures in ensuring safety, security, health and wages of workers.

“The government should regularise the brokers and make them accountable to the authorities concerned for any exploitation of migrants,” she told The Daily Star.

The expatriates welfare minister later spoke as the chief guest at a seminar on “Promoting Ethical Migration Governance” at the Probashi Kalyan Bhaban.

The programme was jointly organised by Warbe Development Foundation, Ovibashi Karmi Unnayan Program and Bangladeshi Ovibashi Mohila Sramik Association.