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Passport crisis stalls manpower export

RAFIQ HASAN
Manpower export from the country is likely to face a setback as hundreds of 'demand orders' for workers have been piled up at various recruiting agencies due to the persisting passport crisis.
"At present I have orders for sending around 600 workers to Saudi Arabia but I could not start processing those because of a passport crisis in the country," said Enam Ahmed Chowdhury, managing director of recruiting agency Dahmashi Corporation Limited.
Managing partner of GMG Trading Golam Moula said passport crisis has stalled their process of sending around 300 people abroad for jobs. " Although we have the demand orders, the persisting crisis has made it quite uncertain whether we would be able to send them."
According to sources in manpower recruiting agencies, 100 to 500 such demand orders are pending with each of the 40 leading agencies in the country, which directly collect demand orders and send people abroad.
They said the crisis would have a negative impact on manpower export from the country.
A worker needs a passport before going for other formalities like visa stamping and medical certificate for overseas employment, which take a lot of time, they pointed out.
When contacted, State Minister for Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment Mohammad Quamrul Islam assured that manpower exporters would get required number of passports if they come through Bangladesh Association of International Recruiting Agencies (BAIRA).
"We have regular contact with BAIRA and they were asked to make a list of passports required by their member agencies for meeting urgent demands," he said.
In this regard, Quamrul Islam referred to his meeting with the home minister and said the requirement of manpower exporters would be met on a priority basis as a good number of passports were kept for this sector.
"There is some crisis but it would not have any major impact on manpower export," he said, adding passport crisis would be resolved by July this year.
President and general secretary of BAIRA could not be contacted as they were out of the country.
Meanwhile, recruiting agencies claimed that the recent hike of passport fees would also affect manpower export, increasing the 'cost' of overseas employment.
They mentioned that the government increased the fees for most urgent passport to Tk 5,000 from Tk 3,200 earlier. Besides, due to a crisis of passport books, issuance of passport in 'very urgent' category was stopped from April 30. "But we
often need urgent passports because employers give us a time frame for sending people," Enam Ahmed said.
Quamrul Islam however said issuance of passports in any category was not stopped but those were being given on a 'rational' basis.
Only a small number of workers need urgent passports and the others do not because they get enough time for this, he said.
An expert said, "We have already lost various overseas employment opportunities and the existing passport crisis would further decrease the labour markets abroad."
Dr Tasnim Arefa Siddiqui of Dhaka University, who was involved in a number of studies on migration of Bangladeshi workers and overseas employment situation, further said, a downward trend in workers' migration from the country has been observed since last year. Previously, 2.50 lakh people on an average went abroad a year for jobs. But the number declined to 1.60 lakh last year.
Failure to meet the changing global requirement of manpower was a major cause of the decline in manpower export, she noted.
According to available statistics, remittance earning stood at 1.81 billion dollars in the first seven months (July to January) of the current fiscal year. The amount was around 33 per cent higher than that in the corresponding period of the previous fiscal year.
Since 1976, a total of 32.93 lakh Bangladeshis went abroad for jobs and the remittance from them totalled Tk 83,762 crore.