Maria Theresa S. Samante, Mar 7, 2006
The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) says that the infrastructure project in Bahrain, Qatar and United Arab Emirates will give many overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) more employment opportunities.
According to the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA), the booming industry of construction in these three countries is a joint government-private sector marketing mission to the Middle East.
Labor and Employment Secretary Patricia A. Sto. Tomas said that after reviewing the labor market in the Middle East by Undersecretary Danilo P. Cruz, together with 42 executives from the private overseas recruitment industry, they promote the OFWs employment in the region.
Sto. Tomas said that according to the Bahrain Minister of Labor, the Bahraini companies would rather choose Filipinos, thus more OFWs are expected to be hired in the next five years.
She also said that the great demands for OFWs in the three countries will continue because these three countries aim for greater modernization and development. Particularly in Qatar, which will host the 15th Asian Games this year, aims to be the international center for sporting events.
In fact, the construction of the Asian Games Athletes Village is on-going in Qatar. Doha, its capital city, will be the second city in the West Asia to host the said event after Iran.
She added that Qatar, being the host of the Asian Games, might need more employment opportunities in retail, transportation and service sectors especially in restaurants and hotels.
Based on POEA’s 2006-2008 marketing plan in the Middle, starting this year up to 2008, Qatar will be needing about 19, 500 ICT workers. This is to support the ICT industry’s privatization and expansion. This means that more ICT workers will be needed in Qatar in the next three years.
Based on the latest deployment statistics of new hires, from January to August last year there are about 19, 725 OFWs deployed in Qatar, signifying that the country was the fourth biggest destination of OFWs in 2005. It was preceded by Saudi Arabia (135,868), UAE (55,013), and Kuwait (25,620). Bahrain, meanwhile, was the sixth biggest destination with 6,662 OFWs deployed to this country in the first eight months of 2005, only preceded by Lebanon with 9,243.
