Bangkokpost, Malaysia, 18 August 2020 - KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia's palm oil producers are embarking on a rare recruitment drive to hire locals and accelerating industry mechanisation as they grapple with a severe shortage of foreign labour due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Free Malaysia today, Malaysia, 17 August 2020 - PETALING JAYA: Sime Darby Plantation Bhd has rolled out the second phase of its “Suara Kami” (Workers’ Voice) helpline which will benefit some 23,000 of the palm oil giant’s migrant workers.
Hindustan Times, India, 16 August 2020 - Millions walked back home during the lockdown and have no income. But there is light at the end of the tunnel
The Star, Singapore, 14 August 2020 - SINGAPORE (The Straits Times/ANN): About one in six foreign workers living in dormitories contracted Covid-19, a calculation based on Singapore's official tally showed, but the true infection rate in the dormitories is likely to be higher than this, experts say.
AA, Lebanon, 14 August 2020 - Estimated 8% of those affected by Beirut explosions are migrant workers, says International Organization for Migration
Khmer Times, Cambodia, 13 August 2020 - Cambodia and the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) of the United Nations have joined hands in a project to protect Cambodian migrant workers and legalise their services during the COVID-19 crisis.
Malaysiakini, Malaysia, 13 August 2020 - Abu (pseudonym) is a migrant worker and since the enforcement of the movement control order (MCO) in March, he has found himself struggling to survive in Malaysia due to the government's policy on foreign labour amid the Covid-19 pandemic.
The Malaysian Reserve, Thailand, 7 August 2020 - Thailand can spark a revival in foreign investment and stimulate its economy by creating alternative quarantine programmes for foreign business travellers, according to a group of industry associations.
The Kathmandu Post, Nepal, 7 August 2020 - Nearly 5,000 Nepali migrant workers have reached out to foreign missions in major labour destination countries to return home on state expenses after the government came up with a plan to repatriate stranded citizens using money from the Migrant Workers’ Welfare Fund.
Malay Mail, Singapore, 7 August 2020 - The multi-ministry task force addressing the Covid-19 pandemic acknowledged a recent spate of suicides and attempted suicides at the coronavirus-hit foreign worker dormitories, and said that managing the workers’ mental health is a “work in progress.”
The New Indian Express, India, 7 August 2020 - About 40 to 45 per cent of the small-scale granite industries have resumed business after lockdown. Reason: Having lost their source of livelihood, migrant labourers, who left for their native places four months ago, were eager to come back to work.
Bloomberg Quint, India, 7 Aug 2020 - An unprecedented large-scale reverse migration of labour triggered by the nationwide lockdown, that saw millions of workers travel across state borders, has put some of the Indian economy’s biggest sectors at risk.
Counter Punch, Global, 7 August 2020 - In a world where nationalism and social division is increasing, bigotry growing, are the words refugee, asylum seeker, migrant worker, derogatory labels triggering prejudice and intolerance? Such terms create an image of ‘the other’, separate and different, strengthening tribalism, feeding suspicion, our common humanity denied.
The Star, Myanmar, 7 August 2020 - Myanmar is standing ready to resume sending its migrant workers abroad, an official from the Ministry of Labour, Immigration and Population told Xinhua on Thursday (Aug 6).
Vietnam Plus, Thailand, 6 August 2020 - The Thai cabinet has approved a plan of the Ministry of Labour to allow more than 500,000 foreign workers with legal documents to stay longer for working in the Southeast Asian country until March 2022.
