Malaysia is one of Asia's biggest employers of foreign labour. But recently, cases of deaths, abuse and forced labour have come to light. What is going on? Who is protecting these migrant workers?
Malaysian Institute of Economic Research (MIER) executive director Dr Mohd
Ariff said the country is now experiencing what he termed as a "jobless
growth," in which the economic growth is at 5.9% during the last five to
six years, but 200,000 fewer jobs were created last year.
<p>He added one of the factors was because various sectors were moving from unskilled
labour-intensive into more knowledge and technology-skilled intensive activities.
</p>
<p>The service sector had also become an important engine of growth for the Malaysian
economy, which he said was contributing 32% to the country’s gross domestic
product. </p>
<p>"The domestic sector is also not vibrant enough. There are huge savings,
but people are not spending. </p>
<p>"The sector is stable, but has not fully recovered from the economic crisis
of 1998," he said at the First Malaysian Student Leaders Summit 2007 here
on Saturday, in which he spoke at a forum on the "Malaysian Economy – Past,
Present and Future." </p>
<p>Dr Mohd Ariff said among the other issues that needed to be addressed were
the growing income disparity, even within the races, which he said were also
happening around the world. </p>
<p>On the expectations for the local economy, he said it was expected to ease
somewhat given the uncertainty for the global economic outlook for this year.
</p>
<p>He also said Malaysia needs to join trade agreements and impart trade liberalisations
policies to ensure good economic growth.</p>
<p><i>Source: http://biz.thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2007/8/4/business/20070804175219&sec=business</i>
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