We need more employees from Bangladesh, says Malaysian palm oil group

13 May 2020 9:50 AM
Collected
The Malaysian Palm Oil Association (MPOA) has appealed to the federal government to approve the recruitment of more workers from Bangladesh as a result of labour shortage in the market.

“Indonesian workers are not coming in and they are not going to come in any time in the future. We need to start to Bangladeshi workers, they'll be our saviour,” explained MPOA leader Datuk Mohamad Nageeb Wahab.

“I hope the federal government will pay attention to us to get Bangladeshi personnel to come in. Maybe not during the Movements Control Order but certainly soon,” he added.

Naqeeb was speaking at the Malaysian Palm Oil Council’s webinar today on “Mitigating the Impact of Covid-19 on the Malaysian Palm Oil Trade”.

He expressed concern over the falling numbers of foreign workers in the market, with regards to attrition, abscondment and repatriation.

As such, he said the first priority is to get the government to extend the work permits of existing labourers, and thereafter to allow more foreign employees.

Nageeb also known as on the government to look at reviewing the taxes levied on the palm oil industry, labelling the current tax structure as archaic.

“It is not attentive to how you perform, it really is responsive to what the government needs. We wish the government to have a radical approach in addressing this matter of taxes.

That is an opportune time to check out it [tax structure], otherwise most of us won't have food on the table, especially the smallholders,” he said.

Tags