By Cher Jimenez
Reporter
THE Philippines does not mind losing its hold on the global market for domestic helpers because it is shifting its sight on the "high-end" jobs and in other untapped economies still to be penetrated by overseas Filipino workers (OFWs), said Labor Secretary Arturo Brion.
"We have given up the lower-end market. To compensate for [that] we are opening up new markets," Brion told reporters at the end of the command conference of Philippine Overseas Labor Offices (POLOs) held Friday.
The Labor secretary's statement was in reaction to threats by recruitment agencies that the Philippines will lose its dominance in the domestic help market because of a new government policy increasing the basic monthly salary of overseas maids from $200 to $400.
The policy, approved by the governing board of the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA), has been in effect since mid-December last year and has been continuously protested by licensed manpower firms.
They argue that many foreign employers are not amenable to doubling the salary of Filipino domestic helpers and would make the country lose its control of the global market.
Almost 10 percent of the 1.095 million OFWs deployed in 2006 were domestic helpers, according to POEA chief Rosalinda Baldoz.
But Brion does not seem to mind losing this market since for five months he has been scouting for new markets for OFWs.
The government is apparently concerned that many OFWs in distress involve mostly domestic helpers who are prone to abuse given the nature of their work.
Marianito Roque, head of the Overseas Worker's Welfare Administration (OWWA), said 7 percent of complaints reaching his office consisted of reports of OFWs in distress. "Eighty percent of these involve domestic helpers," he revealed.
Brion said the Philippines is bent on reaching close to 2 million deployment by 2010 by capturing other economies in need of skilled Filipinos.
In 2006, the country was able to hit a million deployment, the first time it was able to do so since 2001 when the Arroyo administration aimed for it.
To start it off, Brion recently clinched a deal with Canada where an estimated 5,000 OFWs are set to be deployed this year to man the latter's oil and gas industry. He said other "lucrative posts" are being targeted where skilled Filipinos would be sent.
In fact, two nonperforming labor offices are set to be closed this year to give way to two new offices in Australia and New Zealand, according to the Labor chief.
Roque said one of these labor offices that will be shut down is the labor office in Macau.
Former Labor Undersecretary Manuel Imson, who is now the Philippine labor attaché to Geneva, said 21 percent of the "high-end" jobs for OFWs, which include the health, tourism, construction, manufacturing, hotel and tourism, banking and finance, and maritime sectors, are directed in Europe.
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