MORE INDONESIAN MIGRANT WORKERS NEEDED OVERSEAS

By Andi Abdussalam

Jakarta, July 30 (ANTARA)  -  Indonesia, which has so far sent some six million migrant workers overseas and received an average annual remittance of Rp100 trillion, has recently received requests for more workers from a number of employer countries.          The recently revealed requests for immediate employment came from the Middle Eastern countries where about 1.5 - 1.7 million Indonesian migrant workers are already working.          Kuwait, one of the Middle Eastern countries, for example, has asked for an immediate placement of at least 1,600 migrant workers in different fields.          Requests also came in from South Korea which needs some 10,500 Indonesian migrant workers and Germany which is ready to give jobs to about 7,000 Indonesian nurses.          According to the Indonesian Embassy in Kuwait, about 30 major companies in Kuwait need about 1,600 Indonesian professional workers in various fields.          "A total of 30 leading companies in Kuwait have expressed their desires to recruit 1,687 professional workers from Indonesia to be employed in various fields," the embassy said in press statement made available to ANTARA last week.          The embassy has on earlier occasions facilitated a business meeting between major Kuwaiti companies and the National Agency for Placement and Protection of Indonesian Migrant Workers (BNP2TKI).          Companies attending the business meeting included M.H. Al Shaya, Kuwait Automotive Imports Company, Radisson Blu Hotel, Kout Food Group, McDonalds Kuwait, Al Ghanim Industries, Carrefour, Mustafa Karam & Sons Company and Costa Del Sol Hotel.          These Kuwaiti companies expressed their need for workers, some even wanting to recruit before the end of the current fasting month, the embassy said.          According to the report, they need about 100 employees in the fast food sector, 200 retailers at hypermarkets, 409 workers in the manufacturing field, 300  transportation bus drivers, 150 welders, 163 automotive technicians and 365 nurses.          In his address, Indonesian Ambassador to Kuwait Ferry Adamhar said that Indonesian workers working in mainstream sectors are spread out across various parts of the Middle East, particularly in the Gulf countries.          "Employer companies have expressed desires to recruit Indonesian professionals after seeing their hard work and dedication," he claimed.          South Korea, which has so far absorbed 39,652 Indonesian migrant workers, has also asked for 10,500 additional migrant workers from Indonesia.          "South Korea needs 10,500 workers from Indonesia in 2012, and 5,108 Indonesian workers have been sent to South Korea as of July 5 this year," said Jumhur Hidayat, the head of the National Agency for Placement and Protection of Indonesian Migrant Workers (BNP2TKI), in Aceh province over the weekend.          Jumhur said Indonesia's quota for placement in South Korea reached 10,500 this year. Workers will be employed in the industrial, manufacturing, service and agriculture sectors.          The BNP2TKI head said that besides Kuwait and South Korea, Germany has also expressed its need for migrant workers from Indonesia. Germany needs some 7,000 workers, particularly nurses.          "Thus, Indonesian migrant workers, particularly from the nursing and midwifery sector, have a great market potential overseas. What remains to be done is to prepare them and to be ready to bridge the overseas demand for nurses and midwives," Jumhur said.          After all, nurses from Indonesia are known for their unmatched quality. This has been proved in Japan where Indonesian nurses excelled their Philippine counterparts in state exams.          "Many Indonesian and Filipino nurses work at Japanese hospitals and nursing homes for the elderly people," Jamhur said in Pekanbaru at the Riau province on Monday.          He said that the results of a national exam conducted by the Japanese government on March 26, 2012, revealed that a total of 69 (34 nurses and 35 care workers) Indonesian nurses passed the exam in comparison to only  13 nurses from the Philippines. The nurses attended the exam following a year¿s work experience at Japan.          He said that the placement of nurses in Japan was through a government-to-government (G-to-G) program carried out via the Indonesia-Japan Economic Partnership Agreement (IJEPA) signed by President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at Tokyo in November 2006.          BNP2TKI on behalf of the Indonesian government followed up on the agreement in cooperation with the Japan International Corporation of Welfare Services (JICWELS) which represented the Japanese government.          Through the cooperation, BNP2TKI was asked to prepare 1,000 nurses for work in Japan. "We will sign a new agreement if the 1,000 quota is already met following the continuation of the program," Jumhur said.          He said that the agency¿s main task was to seek employment programs for migrant Indonesian workers overseas. In line with this, the agency was seeking and securing overseas employment opportunities for skilled Indonesian migrant workers.          "While the need for meeting the overseas employment market is very urgent, the supply of workers is still being furnished,"  he said at a general lecture to nursing students held in the Imelda Indonesian Workers General Hospital at Medan, North Sumatra.          Jumhur said BNP2TKI has appointed a foreign and promotions cooperation deputy to seek and secure employment opportunities while mapping out employment markets overseas for the domestic workers.          The BNP2TKI chief hoped that the many institutes of higher learning in Indonesia and other educational and skill institutions would continue to teach techniques that are used abroad.          Moreover, migrant workers have proven their ability to mitigate the impact of global economic crisis in the country and have as a result sent an annual remittance of about Rp100 trillion.          Around six million Indonesian migrant workers work in 116 countries with remittance over Rp100 trillion annually, Jumhur said.         Most of the Indonesian migrant workers work in mainstream sectors, and those working in fringe sectors are found only in 14 countries.          But this year, according to Manpower and Transmigration Minister Muhaimin Iskandar, remittances from Indonesian migrant workers abroad are estimated to reach only Rp65 trillion (more than US$6.5 billion).          "The figure is taken based on data from banks and non-bank financial institutions only," he said while breaking his fast with migrant workers at the Sahara Lestari training center for overseas workers in Condet, East Jakarta, on Sunday.***2*** (T.A014/INE/a014) 30-07-2012 17:09:0