Japanese companies face domestic employee shortage

People attend a job fair for Japanese companies in Phnom Penh yesterday. Photograph: Hong Menea/Phnom Penh Post

Thursday, 19 July 2012
Rann Reuy
The Phnom Penh Post

Japanese companies are facing a shortage of skilled workers which is hindering progress in Japanese-owned electronic factories, the Japanese Business Association of Cambodia (JBAC) said.

The statement comes after the Asian Development Bank said in April that a shortage of skilled workers would continue to hinder Cambodia’s economic progress.

Japanese companies currently need about 20,000 to 30,000 skilled workers but employee approximately 10,000 workers, said Kiyotaka Doho, general secretary of JBAC, which consists of 114 Japanese companies.

In late 2011, there were 86 Japanese companies registered in Cambodia in the first six months of this year and another 68 companies registered at the Ministry of Commerce, Kiyotaka Doho said during a Japanese companies job fair yesterday.

Press: Japan Makers To Shut Thai Plants As Flooding Lingers

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

TOKYO (MNI) - Five Japanese carmakers will shut down their factories in Thailand as the massive flooding has forced plant closures in the industrial heart of the country, a key Asian production base for automobiles and electronics, according to media reports.

At least 400 Japanese factories have been inundated in six industrial estates in Ayutthaya and Pathum Thani in the wake of the flooding, which has been continuing for over two months and threatening to hit the capital, the Bangkok Post said.

The death toll in Thailand's worst floods in five decades has surpassed 300, press reports said.

Mazda Motor Corp will idle a Thai plant on Wednesday while Mitsubishi Motors Corp will also suspend production from Thursday, joining leading Japanese automakers which have already halted local operations, the Nikkei said.

Thai floods hit 300 Japanese firms

Tuesday October 18, 2011
Reuters

BANGKOK: At least 300 Japanese companies have been affected by flooding in Thailand and it could be months before all are fully up and running again, according to the local head of the Japan External Trade Organisation (Jetro).

Floods have forced a series of huge industrial estates to close, the latest being the Nava Nakorn Industrial Zone in Pathum Thani province north of Bangkok, which has more than 270 plants employing 270,000 workers.

That was seriously hampering the work of Japanese companies that had made Thailand their manufacturing and export base for South-East Asia, Setsuo Iuchi, the president of Jetro Thailand, said.

Cambodia returns to industrial evolution

Monday, 28 February 2011
Seng Sovan
The Phnom Penh Post

ONE effect of the global economic crisis seldom discussed amid reports of a liquidity crisis and garment sector meltdown was the impact on Cambodia’s manufacturing progress.

In 2008, Cambodia was on the brink of attracting large multinational companies looking for new sources of cheap labour and the latest frontiers of market growth. But these firms subsequently “stayed at home”, in the words of Sok Chenda, secretary general of the Council for the Development of Cambodia, as CEOs looked to damage limitation rather than expansion overseas.

In Cambodia’s case, the economic crisis looks to have only stalled – rather than aborted – the start of a long-awaited transition from labour-intensive industry towards more complex manufacturing. And increasingly, it is Japan that is driving this industrial evolution.

Electronics giant Panasonic launches Cambodian office

Monday, 17 January 2011
Uong Ratana
The Phnom Penh Post

The Cambodian market has high potential. It is located in a very important geographical location.

JAPANESE electronic giant Panasonic launched its first representative office in Cambodia on Saturday, identifying it as a market with “high potential”.

Ikuo Miyamoto, managing executive officer of Panasonic Corporation, highlighted the Kingdom’s “young and dynamic” workforce and praised the government’s encouragement of foreign investment during a meeting at Phnom Penh’s Intercontinental Hotel.

“I strongly feel the great potential of significant growth that Cambodia will perform in the near future,” he said, according to a transcript of the speech.

“The Cambodian market has high potential. It is located in a very important geographical location between Thailand and Vietnam ... That is why Panasonic has decided to open a representative office here ahead of its competitors,” he said.

Japanese company wants to import unskilled workers to Vietnam

Tue, 23 Mar 2010
DPA

Hanoi - A Japanese-owned company in Ho Chi Minh City has requested official permission to bring in unskilled Filipino or Laotian workers because it can no longer find enough Vietnamese ones, officials said Tuesday.

The request by the Nidec Tosok Corp auto parts company has ruffled feathers in Vietnam, where jobs for the growing labour force are a top priority but foreign companies say they cannot find the workers they need in the locations where they need them.

Nguyen Ngoc Quynh Nhu, head of human resources at Nidec Tosok, said many of the company's employees had left recently and found jobs closer to their hometowns. She said new industrial zones had cropped up in provincial areas where the cost of living is lower than in traditional business hubs like Ho Chi Minh City.

"Due to the labour shortage, last month the company made a proposal to import workers to the management board of the Tan Thuan Export Processing Zone," where the factory is located, Nhu said.

Officials said the request was unlikely to be granted.

"The law only allows companies to import skilled workers and experts," said Ho Xuan Lam, deputy head of the Tan Thuan Export Processing Zone. "Vietnam doesn't lack unskilled workers. Many companies can't recruit sufficient workers because of their unattractive salaries."

Nidec Tosok is not the only company to have proposed recruiting unskilled workers from foreign countries.

Nguyen Van Cuu, deputy director of Three Bambi, a Japanese-owned garment company in the Tan Thuan Export Processing Zone, said his company had asked permission to recruit unskilled workers from Cambodia in 2008. He said they had dropped the idea when told the law did not allow it.

The newspaper Lao Dong on Tuesday quoted Nguyen Huu Dung, former director of the Institute for Scientific Labour and Sociology, as saying importing unskilled workers would heighten Vietnam's unemployment rate. He agreed with Lam that companies need to increase salaries to retain employees.

The issue of unskilled foreign workers illegally working in Vietnam became prominent last year, mainly in connection with the use of Chinese workers in Chinese-run bauxite mines in Vietnam's Central Highlands region. Authorities have since tightened their enforcement of work visa laws.

Officials in several southern provinces said factories had faced labour shortages after the lunar New Year, or Tet, in February. Thousands of workers failed to return to their jobs in the footwear, garment, processing and service industries.

Vietnam's economy grew 5.5 per cent in 2009, despite the global economic slowdown. Recent signs of inflation, which hit 1.36 per cent in January and 1.96 per cent in February, could drive workers to seek higher salaries.

Politiktoons No. 96: Toyota

Cartoon by Sacrava (on the web at http://politiktoons.blogspot.com
and also at http://sacrava.blogspot.com)

Japan's Mitsui is studying for food ventures in Cambodia

Mitsui considers Thailand for more food ventures

Thursday April 10, 2008
NAREERAT WIRIYAPONG
Bangkok Post

The Japanese trading giant Mitsui & Co has short-listed Thailand as one of three potential destinations to expand its food business outside its home country to cash in on rising global food prices. Akio Yamamoto, a top executive of Mitsui & Co (Thailand), said the company may invest in fish cultivation and processing in Thailand or other countries in the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) where food sufficiency is high.

The project would involve freshwater fish such as catfish and tilapia, he said.

''Thailand and GMS are the most suitable areas for this project because they produce food a lot more than they need for local consumption,'' said Mr Yamamoto, who is also in charge of Mitsui operations in the GMS. Vietnam and Cambodia are also being studied.

Unlike manufacturers in other sectors such as automobiles and electronics, most Japanese food companies have focused on doing business at home despite their capacity to expand abroad, he said.

''Now it's time for the Japanese food industry to change and come to the world market. This is the area we are looking at,'' said Mr Yamamoto.

''After the sharp increase of oil and steel prices, I think food prices have such a tendency to rise, starting with rice, of which Thailand is the world's number one exporter.''

Given Thailand's abundance of raw materials, Mr Yamamoto said it had the potential to enlarge its presence in the global food business.

''What needs to be done for Thailand is increasing the productivity, food safety and trading ability in the world market,'' he said. ''Our team has worked on investment locations and potential local partners in Thailand.''

In its 100 years in Thailand, Mitsui's only food business has been sugar production. Its two local mills export sugar to Asian markets including Japan, Europe and the Middle East.

''Our new food project is not only looking at the domestic Thai market but also exporting Thai-made food to overseas market,'' Mr Yamamoto said.

But he suggested the government not prolong its price-control strategy. ''To control prices in the short term to help the consumers is fine, but they shouldn't prolong this strategy. If the operations are not profitable, manufacturers have a tendency to cut production.''

Mitsui operates 100 joint ventures in Thailand with total turnover of 100 billion baht forecast for the fiscal year starting this month.

About a quarter of its sales were generated from the iron and steel business, 15% from chemicals, 10% each from infrastructure and food, with the rest from consumer services, such as IT and telecoms, and logistics, he said.

Mitsui is also looking at possibly expanding its infrastructure businesses, which include power and water supply.

''We are considering investing in ... new independent power producer projects, in addition to supplying parts and equipment to power plants as we have done in the past,'' said Mr Yamamoto.