Send efficient diplomats to countries hosting migrant labours
Photo: AFP
A recent report in this daily says that migrant workers remitted $14.17 billion back in 2012. This amounts to a 16.43 percent growth over that of previous year. In 2011, too, the remittance registered 10 percent growth over what it was in 2010. And this year's remittance figure is considered by the experts a new benchmark. However, a study of the World Bank reveals that remittance inflow goes up by $1,000 to up to $11,000 per year with every new expatriate. So if Bangladesh can uphold the trend of manpower export, certainly the growth in this regard will continue. It is a fact that in last fiscal year, manpower export increased 57 percent and the total number of workers who went abroad was 691,402, the second highest in Bangladesh history. It may be mentioned that in 2007-08, around 981,102 went abroad for job, according to the central bank statistics. The measures the government have taken for increasing the outflow of workers and ensuring transfers of remittance quickly to the recipients are praiseworthy. Even so, in some areas the government could do better. Bangladesh government failed to solve problem of renewing visas in some countries, if only because of its insufficient diplomatic efforts. They also showed poor performance in exploring new potential manpower markets. It may be mentioned that Saudi Arabia stopped renewing visas to fresh workers in 2008 while Abu Dhabi stopped such renewal in September last year. We urge the government to appoint efficient and time-tested ambassadors in the countries which have prospects for our workers.
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