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Thursday | 16 January 2025 | Epaper

On International Migrants Day

Published : Saturday, 18 December, 2021 at 12:00 AM  Count : 1247
Md Zillur Rahaman
Md Zillur Rahaman

Md Zillur Rahaman

International Migrants Day is celebrated on December 18 every year in all the member countries of the United Nations. The UN General Assembly decided to observe the day on December 4, 2000 in worldwide. On 18 December, 1990, the UN General Assembly adopted an international agreement in the form of resolution 45/158 to provide adequate security for the interests of migrant workers and the protection of the fair rights of their families.

For a developing country like Bangladesh, remittances are one of the main sources of foreign exchange, it is the lifeblood of the country's economy. The contribution of remittances to economic development is 12 percent of the total GDP and Bangladesh ranks seventh in the world. Remittances sent by expatriates have been able to make a significant contribution to the economic development of Bangladesh.

However, for strong remittances, skilled and trained manpower is required. It is necessary to migrate by acquiring skills through trainingbut in most cases Bangladeshis are migrating with very little skills. As a result, they are not able to engage in the desired work. Due to lack of skills and ignorance, they are being subjected to various abuses and torture.

In the age of industrial revolution, skill is considered as a tool of work. The faster technological knowledge and skills can be developed in a technology dependent world, the easier it will be to keep pace with the times.

But sadly, in the education curriculum of Bangladesh, theoretical knowledge is given more emphasis than the practical knowledge to develop skills in technical education. But in foreign countries most of the recruitment is done on the basis of skill.

The Bureau of Manpower Employment and Training, one of the leading institutes working in Bangladesh for the development of technical skills, has 71 technical training centers in the migration prone areas of the country. The government has plan to take the branches of these training centers to the upazila level. But there is a dearth of skilled trainers to run these technical institutes.

Not only lack of technical knowledge but also many immigrants have little idea about the language, laws and climate of the destination country before migration.

However, with the development of technology in mind, future immigration policy needs to be planned. Therefore, if the knowledge of technology is not able to penetrate into our labour migration aspirants at this time, our labor market may face a threat.
In order to keep the wheel of the war-torn economy in motion, the migration of Bangladeshi migrant workers to the Middle East countries started from 1976. According to the Ministry of Finance, at present more than 12.5 million people from this country are working in more than 174 countries and are enriching the economy of the country. Most of them are working in Middle Eastern countries.

The United Nations immigrant affairs authority International Organization for Migration (IOM) released a report on June 16, 2020, entitled 'Migration in Bangladesh, Family Remittances, Assets and Skills Classification'. According to the survey, highly skilled workers send more money to the country than low skilled workers. As a result of the increase in efficiency, remittances have increased at a monthly rate of about US$ 255 between 2009 and 2019.

How remittances will be invested and saved depends on the skills of the migrants. Skilled immigrants urge family members to invest in foreign exchange as savings. Unskilled migrants, on the other hand, spend their remittances on loan repayments. Highly skilled migrant workers are employed in well-paid jobs and send more remittances than low skilled workers over a long period of time.

The study found that 98 percent of Bangladeshi migrant workers and remittance senders are men. About 12 percent of these migrant workers did not go to school at all and about 80 percent went to secondary school. Of the migrant workers surveyed, half (49 percent) worked as employees of an organization or company and about a quarter (26 percent) worked as day labourers, including part-time and part-time workers.

Bangladesh's reserves have increased due to remittance remittances sent by migrants at a time when the wheels of the economy of many developed countries have come to a standstill during the global coronavirus epidemic.

As remittance inflows begin to decline in early 2020, the World Bank fears that remittances to South Asia are likely to decline. But rejecting that forecast, remittances to the country reached US$ 22 billion in 2020, which is 6.6 percent of GDP. In 2019, the amount of remittances there was US$ 18.36 billion. According to the latest report by the Global Knowledge Partnership and Development, Bangladesh is the seventh largest remittance sending country among low and middle-income countries by 2020, contrary the eighth largest (France received about US$ 24 billion in remittances, which ranked the country seventh in the World Bank report). India topped the list with US$ 83 billion, followed by China at US$ 60 billion, Mexico at US$ 43 billion, the Philippines at US$ 35 billion, Egypt at US$ 30 billion and Pakistan at US$ 26 billion. Bangladesh ranks eighth if France is placed seventh, in the changed situation of 2020, it is positive for Bangladesh. During this period, India's remittances, which were in the first and second place, decreased by 0.2 percent, while that of China decreased by about 13 percent. But the remittance flow of Bangladesh has increased by about 35 percent. Nigeria's remittances, which are second only to Bangladesh's, have declined by 27.7 percent, proving that 2020 was a challenging year for expatriate income.

As a result of the huge number of unskilled workers going abroad from Bangladesh through brokers, only the number of expatriates is increasing. But remittances are not increasing up to the mark. The standard of Bangladeshi workers is far below international standards. If this situation cannot be changed, remittance flow will not increase even if millions of workers go abroad.

Therefore, there is no alternative but to change the conventional education system to create employment abroad. We need to adapt our manpower to the demands and changes of the manpower importing countries. This requires skilled and trained manpower and they can turn the wheel of remittances. For this, the government has to take planned steps to build skilled manpower to support development.

Md Zillur Rahaman, banker and freelancer









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