|
Tuesday, August 01, 2006
Cabaero: Flaw in deployment policy
By Nini B. Cabaero
Beyond 30
The armed conflict between Israel and Lebanon is making obvious the flaw in the Philippine gov-ernment’s policy of sending Filipino workers abroad.
The exchange of missiles between Israel and the Lebanon-based Hezbollah guerrillas has disrupted the work of thousands of Filipinos in the two countries. This means a major evacuation plan for them that would test the resources of the Philippine government, and a halt in the sending of dollars to their families here.
All these could lead to a reshuffling of government’s funding priorities and, on the part of the families of overseas Filipino workers, an immediate belt-tightening or borrowing of money to tide them over until the next remittance comes.
Dr. Ernesto Pernia of the School of Economics of the University of the Philippines in Diliman made an interesting point during his talk on the “Diaspora, Remittances and Poverty in RP’s Regions” at the University of San Carlos here last Friday. Pernia said the deployment of overseas Filipino workers should only be temporary, while there are no better opportunities here.
Economic policies must be formulated to generate more local employment, he said. “The phenomenon should be transitory to allow the government to do its homework in making the economy stronger,” Pernia said, according to a Sun.Star Cebu report last Saturday.
He said dollar remittances of these overseas workers help the economy because they put money in the pockets of families they left behind. The number of Filipinos leaving the country for work abroad increases day by the day and, with this diaspora, the amount of remittances they send back to the families left behind rises.
While Filipinos abroad do their part in helping the economy, the Philippine government needs to do its part too in creating local jobs.
Pernia spoke of government’s complacency that is one of the “moral hazard effects” of the increase in the deployment of Filipino workers.
According to the Migrant Workers and Overseas Filipinos Act of 1995, “The State does not promote overseas employment as a means to sustain economic development.” But the opposite is happening because the dollar remittances of Filipino workers are saving the country from financial collapse. This has been proven more than once since the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s.
The tension in Israel and Lebanon makes the call for a review of government’s strategy toward deploying Filipinos workers abroad timely. There are more than enough compelling reasons to review the overall policy of sending Filipino workers abroad as a way of saving the country’s economy.
For Bisaya stories from Cebu. Click here. (August 1, 2006 issue)
Write letter to the editor.Click here.
Join the Sun.Star message board.Click here. |
|
[return to top]
[home]
[network page]
|
LOCAL NEWS
BUSINESS
OPINION
SPORTS
LIFESTYLE
FEATURE
SUPERBALITA
WEEKEND
|
