![]() |
Cambodian passport |
13 December 2012
By Chhay Channyda and Stuart White
The Phnom Penh Post
Yesterday, Hun Sen and Ministry of Labour officials vehemently denied that migrant workers paid any more than their official discounted rate for passports – about $24.
As the lure of Thailand grows increasingly attractive for cash-strapped
and under-employed Cambodians, Prime Minister Hun Sen yesterday made a
public appeal for workers to stay in the country, simultaneously urging
the Cambodian market to up its competitive edge.
In a speech at the inauguration of a new administrative building for the
Ministry of Labour, Hun Sen admonished employers, and garment
manufacturers in particular, to make the domestic market more attractive
to workers, citing Cambodia’s ongoing labour shortage.
“I think that if [the garment industry] gave them higher wages, the workers would like going to work,” the prime minister said.
“And right now, the problem for the industry is competition to recruit workers.”
At times, the premier’s speech read like a lecture in basic supply-side economics.
“Don’t blame the government for not caring that [factories] are bankrupt,” he said.
“We cannot force the workers to work for you for a lower wage than others.”
Meanwhile, in neighbouring Thailand, despite looming mass deportations,
more than 50,000 Cambodians have successfully registered as legal
migrant workers, making themselves eligible for a recently instated 300
baht daily minimum wage – a salary that comes to just under $300 a
month,
or more than three-and-a-half times the basic salary of a Cambodian garment worker including mandatory bonuses and allowances.
In his remarks, Hun Sen pointed to the availability of local jobs,
saying workers don’t have “to be at risk” working overseas. That risk is
very real, even for legal migrants, according to Andy Hall, a labour
migration expert at Mahidol University in Thailand, but workers will
continue to be drawn to Thailand unless Cambodia can offer work “to
their people in industries that provide long-term and reliable jobs”.
“If [they’re legal migrants], they are frequently exploited by unregulated Thai and Cambodian agencies,” Hall said via email.
“If [illegal], they frequently fall prey to corrupt traffickers,
smugglers and law enforcement officials. If they are lucky and get a
good job, they can earn more than they would in Cambodia, and hopefully
this will more often be the case after the January 1st increase in the
national minimum wage.”
Dave Welsh, country director for the American Center for International
Labor Solidarity, said that the ongoing expansion of the garment
industry in Cambodia had “definitely” created a domestic labour
shortage, but at the same time, wages had remained low.
“The industry is booming,” he said. “The buyers in the EU and the market
in the EU is expanding rapidly, so there’s definitely room for the
brands to kick in more wages.”
Ken Loo, secretary-general of the factory representative the Garment
Manufacturers Association of Cambodia, said he would be in favour of a
measure that saw increased wages – but only if output would go up as
well.
“We support that, as long as we get in return a corresponding increase
in productivity... and most importantly, correspondingly, an increase in
the price we get from the buyers,” Loo said.
“Demand [for labour] is higher than supply in Phnom Penh, so why haven’t
prices risen to reach equilibrium?” Loo went on to ask, noting that
factories had increased wages above the minimum wage until running into
resistance from the brands they supply. “We don’t have the ability to go
any further. Any more that we go, it’s a loss.”
Welsh acknowledged that, given the industry’s structure, local factories
are “squeezed” by brands, making more “creative” options like nutrition
plans for workers more beneficial in the Cambodian system.
Welsh also noted that while the Thai minimum wage is higher than that in Cambodia, it comes with unexpected costs.
“If [migration is] done legally, you’re paying hidden fees,” he said.
“The cost of living [in Thailand] is a lot higher than it is in rural
Cambodia. So it’s a bit of a red herring to say the pay is better
because the wage is higher. And in the [Thai] garment sector, a lot of
it is informalised, whereas in Cambodia, at least it’s formalised.”
Nonetheless, said Moeun Tola, head of the labour program at the
Community Legal Education Center, “if there is still low pay, we cannot
stop [workers from migrating], and the working conditions in this
country are also a problem”.
Tola also highlighted hidden costs – specifically the high passport
fees, which he characterised as “money under the table” – as a driver of
illegal immigration, which compounds risks for migrant workers.
“Samdech [Hun Sen] only receives reports from his officials, but he
doesn’t know his officials’ secrets that they’re trying to hide from
him,” he said.
“We have evidence that if workers want to go to Thailand, they have to
pay officials between $150 to $300, and when workers ask them why, they
reply that it’s to make the passport.”
Yesterday,
Hun Sen and Ministry of Labour officials vehemently denied that migrant
workers paid any more than their official discounted rate for passports
– about $24.
0 comments:
Post a Comment