10/11/06 (The Star)  -  MIRI: The number of foreign workers employed in multi-billion ringgit commodities and plantation sectors in the country has surpassed that of local workers.

Plantation Industries and Commodities Minister Datuk Peter Chin Fah Kui said there were now 473,081 foreigners working in places like oil-palm estates, rubber plantations and cocoa plantations, while local workers totalled only about 300,000.

“This is very worrying because the increasingly high costs of importing foreign labourers into the country is affecting our competitive edge in these money-spinning sectors.

“Up to 35% of the costs of production incurred by companies in these sectors goes into paying the salaries of foreign workers, their levy, their medical expenses and other related costs,” he said.

As at June 30, 2006, out of the 473,081 foreign workers, 332,815 were Indonesians and 27,273 Indians. The rest were from the Philippines, Nepal and others.

“Malaysia urgently needs to offset this high cost of production because if our cost of labour is so much higher compared to Indonesia, we will lose out in terms of our competitiveness in our export market,” he told a press conference here.

He said Malaysia must be more efficient in terms of costs of production and also increase its yield at steady rate and create new markets all the time, especially in Europe and the Americas.

“We are now neck-and-neck with Indonesia in the world market in terms of oil palm export. Five years ago, Malaysia controls up to 70% of the global market. Now, Malaysia and Indonesia are about 50% each.” 

Chin said Malaysian palm oil producers must increase its annual yield from the current four tonnes per hectare per year to at least six tonnes by using better quality clones and fertilisers if they want to keep ahead of the aggressive Indonesian competitors.