Nepal's complication on foreign employment

Foreign Employment: Need or Greed?

Nepal has witnessed a long history of foreign employment. The historical evidences mention it was during the 19^th century when near about 200 Nepalese youths, particularly warriors migrated to Lahore, Pakistan to fight for Sikh ruler, Ranjit Singh and since then foreign employment is a major source of employment for us with more than 1.7 million working in India only. In today’s Nepal, both male and female find it relatively easier to ensure their better life in foreign land, however their expectations and harsh reality seem to have polarized far off from one another. An estimated 4,00,000 youths enter Nepalese market every year and in the absence of job opportunities and a fair competition, they travel towards India and other overseas nations seeking descent jobs. Political turmoil, years of conflict and economic hardship are the other major reasons behind huge exodus of such potential human resources.

According to annual report for Fiscal Year (FY) 2071/72 published by the Department of Foreign Employment (DoFE), 5,27,814 citizens boarded off for foreign soil which is 8% higher in comparison to 4,53,543 of FY 2069/70. In the first ten months of the current fiscal year, 348,628 have already taken approval for foreign employment and the rate is expected to rise significantly. An estimated figure of 1500 people waiting for departure at Tribhuwan International Airport (TIA) on a daily basis is an anti-thesis for all those who are still reluctant if there’s disproportional outflow of manpower.

The above figures do not give the actual number of those departing for foreign employment because many Nepalese leave for foreign employment through their contractors in India and their numbers remains unknown. So, the above is only the representative figure of those leaving from TIA through legal channels.

In between all facts and figures, there is a huge contribution of foreign employment in country’s economy i.e. 29.1% of total GDP. During the first ten months of FY 2015/16, the total remittance inflow to Nepal was Rs. 538.87 billion with 10.2% growth in comparison to 617.28 billion of previous fiscal year. The data presented by World Bank, 2015 show that Nepal is among top five countries to receive remittance as a share of its GDP. The Middle East nations are the major job providers since the Oil Boom of 1970’s and post-Gulf war of 1990’s and the need of employees in the region is extremely high. The following graph represents the major destination of Nepalese migrants including male and female during FY 2070/71:

Nations	Male	Female	Total
Qatar	126549	2325	128874
Malaysia	208120	6029	214149
Saudi Arabia	85905	971	86876
United Arab Emirates	49886	5079	54965
Kuwait	11393	7960	19353
Bahrain	3738	447	4185
Oman	2292	1143	3435
South Korea	1821	308	2125
Lebanon	306	811	1117
Israel	178	496	674
Afghanistan	598	7	605
Japan	1964	134	2098
Others	6098	3260	9358
Total	498848	28966	527814

                                                                        (Source: Department of Foreign Employment, 2014/15)

Although the escalating trend of migration opens up new doors of economic prosperity and opportunities, the complexities unleashed by it are unavoidable. Deception of workers begins from the manpower agencies which charge high for their placement, staking all their properties as collateral. Lacking endowment of specialized skills and poor academic qualification has resulted in low pay for long hours of monotonous physical efforts with payments often delayed by the contractors. Migrant workers are often reported to be deprived of accessing basic rights of proper food, hygienic living condition, dignified life and sound health. The issue of physical and mental abuses from the employers remains unaddressed lacking proper channel to raise their voice and absence of labor agreements with the host nations. The problems of the migrant workers have multiplied because many migrant workers leave the country without proper knowledge, education, skills and/or training placing a high trust on the agencies which facilitate their paperwork and in most cases they are found to be cheated. It is a common scene at TIA to see many migrant workers who are all set to board a plane in the upcoming few hours asking the fellow passengers to fill out the departure information form for them. Many migrant workers are found to be illiterate even with lack of basic knowledge to fill out a small form that can be filled in Nepali or English language. So a question may arise in the minds of the readers if these migrant workers will be able to speak out in case of any injustice in the foreign soil where language becomes the first barrier. So their struggle starts from day one, from the time their plane takes off the TIA.

If we reflect in our inner selves, there seems to be a growing trend of consumerism amongst many Nepalese, specially the youths. We need I-phones, motorbikes, houses in the cities, good looking clothes, sunglasses, branded watches and many more and we are ready to place ourselves in tough situations for the sake of fulfilling our dreams – the greed planted within us. If we talk to many migrant workers, they are found to be talking on the good sides of the foreign countries. They talk about facilities, services, infrastructures, beauty of the roads and the seas, good-good and only the good but they are rarely found to be talking about the hardships at their jobs, their working conditions, the difficult bosses, how they were deceived by their agents and the struggle in the first few months, the pain of the family separation and many more. Many of those who have left the country are found to be posting their Facebook profiles or pictures in Instagram or other social communication applications posing in the malls or in the clean roads and they in one way are showing off and on the other are luring many other Nepalese who see their posts back home and dream of taking the next flights someday anytime soon if possible to spend part of their lives in the so dreamt destinations. We rarely find anyone posing at their workplace. So these two habits are also unintentionally advertising and luring many more who will turn migrant workers in the near future.

A recent research report on Nepalese migrant workers reveals the presence of HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) during their stay which is carried back to Nepal on return. On the other hand, the death toll of migrant Nepali workers is soaring because of employers’ reluctance to provide facilities despite mentioned on Memorandum of Understanding. The Foreign Employment Promotion Board (FEPB) records a total of 842 deaths of Nepali migrant workers in the destination countries during FY 2013/2014, heart failure being the cause of death of 247 workers. The recent suicidal attack over 12 Nepalese migrants in Kabul, Afghanistan gripped the entire nation with sorrow exposing the vulnerabilities and security situation of Nepalese at war-torn countries.

What is more ironic is that the families of the Nepali diaspora have to face many legal obstacles even to bring back the bodies of their loved ones once they are dead, under “Kafeela System” practiced in Muslim nations. This system compels the legal migrant to have a sponsor within the country who supervises his/her activity and mainly is responsible for visa and legal status. There are dead bodies of workers placed in the coffins still waiting to be deported. This trait is an open negligence of Article 5 of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations 1961 signed by UN member nations which clearly stands in favour of “protecting workers in the receiving state from the sending state under international law”. In case of illegal migrants, government lacks any accurate information on their current status as they have been missing for long or willingly out of communication. Things turn out to be worst when women are trafficked through illegal transit of Delhi and Dubai and sold over to either brothels or as domestic slaves. Maiti Nepal’s annual report 2014 shows 1,34,718 migrants were informed at the border and 1533 out of them went missing once they crossed the international border, however they were able to find 342 migrants and assist them.

To address the grievances, there seems an immediate need to call for an action. Though the Government of Nepal being accountable to ensure safety and security of its citizens has taken an initiative to establish supporting mechanism for women workers at the Embassies, results are not satisfactory. The government should highly discourage individual labor permits which makes laborer more prone to abuses, both mentally and physically. Mobilization of its technocrats for maintaining database of migrant workers can at least help the government to communicate with its citizens in needs and crises. Government needs to credit the efforts of various Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) such as Maiti Nepal with further technical and financial assistance to tackle trafficking of Nepalese women. Furthermore, the effectiveness of inter agencies coordination of Government of Nepal should be improved to implement cross verifying mechanism, discouraging the unprofessional practices of the lucrative business of manpower agencies, tagged as “traders of modern day slaves”.

Undoubtedly, the inflow of remittance is necessary economic operation of the underdeveloped nations like ours but insufficient for sustainable economic growth. “Is foreign employment going to solve the unemployment of future generations?” The question seems simple, yet can be answered through various dynamics. Sooner or later, what we will have to realize is exporting cheap labor at the cost of our stagnant economic growth of 0.77% is not beneficial for the future generations. There is an immense possibility for youths within Nepal to be self-reliant once they acquire capacity development training where the government too needs to coordinate for green growth. An approach to agro decentralization can pave the way for residents of all the areas in transforming subsistence farming to commercial one.

Yes, implementation of these initiatives does not seem to be straightforward but as a micro level effort we can at least develop a culture of investing remittance in productive sector such as hydro power, road and other physical infrastructure. This is a short-term strategy for portfolio investment till the long-term framework is railed up for action. What we necessarily need to intuit is there’s no alternative to practice of self-reliance for sounder economy and job creation. The development of the nation is a mirage until political stakeholders capitalize on its youth overcoming their political hegemony.