Foreign remittance and Bangladesh

Most of the migrated workers of Bangladesh are working in the Middle East- Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Oman, Bahrain, and many other countries. There is hardly any country where Bangladeshi workers are not available. I have got an opportunity to speak with a huge number of Bangladeshi overseas workers. It is a misfortune for the government of Bangladesh that it can't send manpower with high educational background and able to speak more than one language. On the other hand, most of the people of India are efficient enough to work aboard having high educational background and language proficiency. In maximum cases Indian workers hold top positions of management of any organisation and labour forces come from Bangladesh and are exploited by the management. Bangladeshi workers are lagging behind to compete with others due to lack of language efficiency and higher education. They are losing the capacity of bargaining with their employers. According to a labourer working in Qatar, they are facing problems due to negative country branding as a result of corruption in our country. Others are taking this advantage from the employers who are discouraged to employ Bangladeshi workers. The economy of Bangladesh is still going upward due to foreign remittance. I am very much worried that how long Bangladesh can depend on this flow of remittances. Workers blame the government for not taking proper initiatives to open up new labour markets along with the existing one. The government has no definite plan regarding the overseas employer. Many workers point finger at Bangladeshi embassies which are not working properly on this issues. It is mentionable that Saudi Arabia is the biggest overseas labour market of Bangladesh. India earns more money through workers from America and the United Arab Emirates than from Saudi. In the last fiscal year, Bangladesh and Pakistan received almost the same amount of remittances from Saudi Arabia, $3.7 billion. Bangladesh is losing her image like Pakistan. The government should not depend only on uneducated labour forces. One of the government employees working in Qatar said that the government should concentrate on sending university graduates where India leads. Not sending the meritorious university graduates to other countries is a common tendency in our country. Bangladesh should be more careful to mix up the educated skilled and uneducated skilled manpower. If we don't think about it now, we may lose market. Finally, I am thankful to the government for its present initiative regarding Malaysia proposal. Md Masud Parvej A student of M Phil mmparvej_35_cubd@yahoo.com