Overseas employment sector deserves more attention

In 1971, contribution of agriculture, industry and service sectors to Bangladesh's gross domestic product (GDP) was 51.03 per cent, 7.68 per cent and 41.28 per cent respectively. Similarly, it was 31.55 per cent, 20.63 per cent, and 47.81 per cent in 1980. Later on in 1990, it was 32.75 per cent, 20.69 per cent and 46.55 per cent in that order. The contribution of the sectors to the GDP in 2000 was 23.77 per cent, 23.31 per cent and 52.91 per cent respectively and in 2015, 15.50 per cent, 28.14 per cent and 56.34 per cent respectively.
Evidently, Bangladesh is going through a transition from an agriculture-based economy into an industrialised one. Agriculture has an optimum point of production that could not be augmented by increasing any inputs. Therefore, the government is encouraging industrialisation to facilitate poverty reduction and employment generation and foreign currency earning by increasing exports.
Since independence, one segment of the country's GDP - service sector - is rising sharply without much efforts and measures. It has grown from 41.28 per cent to 56.34 per cent.
The contribution of the industrial sector has increased from 7.68 per cent to 28.14 per cent with the growth of ready-made garments (RMG), leather, plastic, agro-processing and other industrial sub-sectors. The government offered uninterrupted letter of credit (L/C) facility, bonded warehouse facility and cash incentives, and negotiated with the World Trade Organisation (WTO), regional trade blocs and bilateral forums to ensure duty-free and quota-free facilities to the manufacturing sub-sectors. The RMG sector alone earned $25.49 billion from export in FY 2014-15.
     Conversely, Bangladesh received $15.31 billion remittance in FY 2014-15 from 0.6 million overseas workers. Most of them are semi-skilled and unskilled. How much cash incentives did the government provide for them? How much tax did the government relax for them? How many trade delegations negotiated with foreign recruiters regarding the welfare of Bangladeshi overseas workers? How many free-trade agreements were signed specifically to promote the flow of overseas workers to the destined countries? How many institutes or universities did the government establish to increase their skills so that they could earn more with the same service?
Anyways, the overseas employment sector is the second highest source of foreign currency earning for Bangladesh.
The export of manpower from Bangladesh started in 1976 with a modest number of 6,078. At present, about 6.07 million Bangladeshi migrants are engaged in overseas employment in more than 100 countries. In terms of remittance, 2014 and 2015 are the highest-earning years with $14.94 billion and $15.27 billion respectively. About 49.65 per cent of Bangladeshi overseas workers are less skilled, 31.75 per cent are skilled, 15.15 per cent are semi-skilled and only 2.3 per cent are professionals. Comilla has the highest number of overseas-employed population - about 11 per cent of the total overseas employed population - followed by Chittagong at 9.57 per cent, Brambanbaria at 5.22 per cent, Dhaka at 4.48 per cent and Chandpur at 4.16 per cent. The top destinations of Bangladeshi overseas workers include Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates (UAE), Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman, Malaysia, South Korea and Singapore.
An overseas worker faces following challenges while migrating:
1.    A section of officials of the Department of Immigration and Passports Office do not allegedly issue a passport without bribe or harassment.
2.    Excessive profit motives of the recruiting or visa agencies leads to the charging of an abnormal price as visa fee.
3.    Procedural irritations in some legal institutions at home and abroad.
4.    Non-payment, underpayment, delayed payment, poor living conditions, refusal to provide air tickets at the time of exit, non-adherence to the terms and conditions of employment by the sponsors.
5.    Sometimes workers are repatriated after becoming handicapped temporarily or permanently due to some accidents without proper treatment or compensation.
6.    If a migrant worker dies at his workplace abroad then carrying the dead body is a burden for the victim's family.
7.    In most cases, the victim's family does not receive insurance or other benefits due to non-claim for the benefits.
8.    Though the government pays around Tk.300,000 to the victim's family (if a worker dies abroad), the system is too cumbersome and lengthy.   
9.    Sometimes, recruiting agents do not provide any money receipt for receiving money from the migrant workers.
10.    Sometimes, recruiting agents do not hand over the requisite papers like employment agreements or visa papers to the workers - they deliver it at the last moment before departure.
11.    Sometimes, recruiting agents do not appear to assist the workers who are facing various problems related to their contracts in the destination country.
         The government could remove most of the problems if following actions could be taken:  
1.    Activating relevant government agencies with the spirit of service providers rather than regulators.
2.    Collecting demands for workers and professionals from foreign recruitment authorities and supply visa documents to the selected workers and professionals with a reasonable margin of profit.   
3.    Searching new destinations and new professions to increase remittance earnings.  
4.    Providing training on high demand trades and exporting skilled workers instead of unskilled or semi-skilled workers.
5.    Using embassies as a service centres for the overseas workers.
The writer is the Deputy Manager of SME Foundation, Bangladesh.
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