Youth joblessness in Cambodia [-Rong Chhun: Only about 10% of graduating students find jobs]

11 November 2007
By Keo Pech Metta
Radio Free Asia
Translated from Khmer by Socheata

A number of NGO officials who are working on Cambodian youth issues indicated that among Cambodian youth, especially those who completed their degrees in high schools and universities, the majority of them cannot find a job currently, and that this issue will bring hardships to the Cambodian society in the future if there is no timely resolution to this matter.

Mak Sarat, a coordinating official for the Youth Council of Cambodia (YCC), indicated that, based on civil society’s observation on the youth, each year between 300,000 to 350,000 Cambodian youth are looking for jobs to make a living, however, among all these youths, only 50,000 to 60,000 of them can find work. Therefore the joblessness problem is a major issue that the government must resolve.

Mak Sarat indicated: “The government is responsible as the ruler of the country, and it should organize to create a large job market by attracting investments, or by sending the youths to work overseas based on clear regulations. The youths themselves should put in their effort by considering themselves as part of the labor force, they should obtain the ability to produce, just like factory workers who must learn expertise, and these youths should have a true purpose and be honest.”

Regarding the joblessness issue among high school and university students, Rong Chhun, President of the Cambodia Independent Teachers’ Association (CITA), said that it is necessary for the government to further expand the job market for the people because from one year to another, the number of jobless people keeps on increasing, especially among the many tens of thousands of youths who completed their schooling, but ended up facing joblessness instead.

Rong Chhun added: “Each year, several tens of thousands finish school, but only about 10% of them find jobs, and those who are jobless amount to 90%. This problem is one that the government leader must bear responsibility for, if he neglects this issue and allows Cambodian students to remain jobless, our society will face problems in the future.”

In response to the issues raised above, Oum Mean, the deputy secretary of the Ministry of Labor and Vocational Training (MoLVT), said that his ministry, like the government itself, is working hard in the past and currently to attract various companies to invest in Cambodia, such as garment factories and other type of companies, in order to create a job market for the population, including students who completed their studies.

Oum Mean added that, besides this, the government is also looking at overseas markets, such as South Korea, Malaysia, Thailand, etc… so that Cambodian workers can go to work there. Currently, there are about 20,000 Cambodians who are working overseas in various countries.

Oum Mean said: “Therefore the ministry (MoLVT) is putting its effort so that investors remain and that they will continue to invest, and we are also attracting other investors to invest in Cambodia. When there are investments, there will be factories, companies, farms, or service industry such as the hotel industry for example, then our people will have jobs.”

Chiming on this issue, Osman Hassan, the MoLVT secretary of state, indicated that the provision of overseas jobs benefits also those with low level of education, because his ministry has set up good relationships between the ministry and companies which also include a short training for workers before they leave to work overseas.

Osman Hassan said: “In fact, it is the ministry (MoLVT) which puts its effort to seek a job market, both for workers with low level of education, and for students with higher education. In fact, since we put in our effort, there are a number of countries where our workers went, such as South Korea and among these, there are some students who went also. However, the salary in South Korea is high, in average, the lowest salary is between $500 to 600, and some even get up $1,500. Therefore, for our students, when they hear about going to South Korea, a lot of them want to go work there also.”

Mak Sarat said also that in order to resolve the joblessness issue for Cambodian youths who are currently facing difficulties, a number of NGOs, including the YCC and the Youth Stars of Cambodia, are setting up a program to provide volunteer service by high school and university students so that they can gain experience with various organizations and institutions, or within the community. These opportunities will provide an assets for these youths to help them find a job in the future also.

Mak Sarat indicated: “Normally in Cambodia, experience is needed, even if we finish school, if we don’t have experience, it’s hard to find a job. Therefore, now there are volunteers in 9 of the provinces and municipalities who constitute a network of volunteer youth from the YCC, there are almost 2,000 participants, and in 402 communes, we can see that when they participate in either the YCC or other NGOs (volunteer work), they have the opportunity to find work.”

Osman Hassan indicated also that for the MoLVT and the government, besides the help they provided to find a job market for the population, they are also cooperating with local and overseas investment companies to expand the search for job markets with various countries, including Singapore, Hong Kong, and Arabic countries.

Regarding the job market issue, Robert Zoellik, President of the World Bank, who recently visited Cambodia, said also that Cambodia needs to provide a job market to at least 300,000 people each year in order to respond to the jobs demand in the country.

Cambodian migrants banned from working in Thailand's restive south

Thursday, March 29, 2007
The Associated Press

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia: Cambodia has banned its migrant laborers from working in insurgency-plagued southern Thailand due to safety concerns, an official said Thursday.

Thailand's southernmost provinces of Yala, Pattani and Narathiwat have been the scene of an Islamic insurgency that has led to more than 2,000 deaths in the past three years. The three provinces form the only Muslim-dominated area in the Buddhist-majority country.

In a letter to Cambodia's Labor Ministry, Foreign Minister Hor Namhong asked that all labor-exporting companies not send any workers to the Thai provinces that are currently "experiencing insecurity problems, including many killings."

A copy of the letter, dated March 19, was obtained Thursday by The Associated Press.

Um Mean, a deputy labor minister, said there are more 70,000 registered Cambodian workers in Thailand's provinces along its southeastern border with Cambodia.

Although there are no companies that export workers to Thailand's deep south, the ministry has instructed all 13 of Cambodia's licensed labor-exporting companies to comply with the ban, Um Mean said by telephone Thursday.

Um Mean described the ban as a "precaution we had better take" now rather than later.

"The main reason behind it is safety concerns for the lives of our workers. In addition, a dangerous incident could produce difficulties for both countries," he said.

Laborers returning from Thailand accuse company of deceit

Cambodian Press Review
By Media Consulting and Development

Nearly 40 Cambodian laborers who have been returned home from neighboring Thailand have accused recruitment firm Top Manpower of committing deceit by failing to follow the contracts they signed before being sent to work in a rubber-processing factory, newspapers report.

Prior to their return one of the workers told Kek Galabru, president of Cambodian human organization Licadho, by phone from Thailand that they could not stand working at the Southland Resource Factory in Thailand’s Nakhon Si province as they were receiving salaries that differed from the level agreed upon in the work agreements, according to Rasmei Kampuchea in its Wednesday edition.

Returnee Heng Saroeun, who left Cambodia in late January, said that according to the contracts he would be paid 250 baht (nearly US$7.5) for eight hours of work per day plus free accommodation and three daily meals, but in reality he received only 170 baht (about US$5) for 10 hours of work per day without the promised room and board, reports Cambodge Soir. Following negotiation, the factory agreed to offer each worker 15 kilograms of milled rice, added the Kompong Cham provincial resident.

Licadho official Hun Seang Hak, said that 43 Cambodian workers at the rubber factory quit last week due to the failure to implement the contracts, the bad smell from the rubber and the fact that their passports were confiscated as a guarantee for deductions from their salaries for debts owed to Top Manpower, wrote Rasmei Kampuchea.

The 43 workers appealed to Licadho for intervention enabling a return to Cambodia, but only 37 of them have come back, because the remaining six decided to continue work at the factory on the grounds that they have too much debt in their home country, reports Samleng Yuvechun Khmer.

The return comes after Kek Galabru traveled to Thailand Sunday and met rights partners and officials from the International Organization for Migration there, who agreed to pay for the transportation of the workers through the Poipet border checkpoint, continues the newspaper.

Some of the returnees are demanding compensation from Top Manpower, claiming they spent a great deal of money before getting work in Thailand.

“We borrowed from other people to be able to depart for work in Thailand , hoping to earn much. In that country, we were not touring. We went there to do hard work. But we were cheated,” Cambodge Soir quotes Heng Saroeun as saying.

Kek Galabru said that her group would interview the 37 returnees to find out exactly what had happened and would then decide what next steps should be taken, according to the newspaper.

In response to Top Manpower’s alleged failure to follow the contracts, the firm’s general director, Orn Bun Hak told Rasmei Kampuchea that the workers did perform eight hours to 10 hours per day and obtained only 140 baht to 170 baht because they were not accustomed to the work, as they had just done the first month of a probation period.

Even during that period, the workers insisted on 230 baht to 250 baht in wages, he explained, adding that the company could not agree to the request as they remained in the list of probation staff.

“They wanted the contracts to be respected, but they failed to think of the Thai law that stipulates period of trial. First, they had to get used to work before they could work with normal salaries,” said the company’s manager, reports Cambodge Soir.

“Immediately workers phoned and told me they were working like machines and it was really difficult….Of course, it is so. It is a hard job. And they had never done the work before. They are farmers who can rest whenever they want to do so to smoke or sing for fun,” added Orn Bun Hak. “It is difficult to work with Cambodian workers, who once did more farming rather than contractual work for two years.”

He said that another more than 100 Cambodian laborers could be returned home before their two-year employment contracts expire, concludes the newspaper.

Company taking laborers to work overseas taking advantage of poor young women?

Company taking Cambodian workers to Malaysia is facing problems in Kratie?

21 Feb 2007
By Or Phearith
Radio Free Asia
Translated from Khmer by Socheata

A couple of mother and daughter are looking for intervention to counter the accusations made by a company which is transporting laborers to work overseas.

The coupled looked for intervention after 19-year-old Tim Sok Heang, from Keng village, Chrauy Banteay commune, Prek Prosob district, said on 20 Feb that she was escaping from the premises of a company which promised to take her and three other girls to work as laborers in Malaysia. She escaped after she encountered several problems at the company, such as the company’s people making fun of the girls, forcing them to take pictures while wearing see-through clothes, etc… “Back then, what we faced was not right, they told us to dress in see-through clothes, just like being naked, they took our pictures and save it on the computer where they were viewing them… Taking such indecent photos is like turning us into prostitutes,” Sok Heang said.

Sok Heang added that during the one-month training, the company provided, she fell ill, but she was threatened and prevented from calling her parents and relatives.

Faced with hardship, Sok Heang and Srey Touch, her younger cousin, escaped the company. When they arrived home, Sok Heang said that she received a phone threat telling her to go back or else she could be arrested and she will face beating.

Sok Heang said that besides herself and her cousin who escaped, another girl, Sok Leap, had to have her family paid 200,000 riels ($50) to the company in order to be released. Currently, the family of another girl, Chuon Srey Mach, is looking for intervention for her release back from the company without having to pay the $520 fee the company contract imposed as fine, in the event these girls decide not to go to work overseas.

Sok Sen, a representative of the Ung Rithy Group based in Phnom Penh, clarified by phone that Sok Heang defames his company’s reputation. Therefore, she must pay back some of the expenses the company incurred. “In reality, I just want her to pay back my expense because she listened to other people. She is poor, she does not think about it herself, all the problems came from her own only, but she went and defamed my company’s reputation,” Sok Sen said.

Sok Sen accused Sok Heang of listening to unfounded incitements, and it made her lost an opportunity to earn money for her very poor family.

Mrs. Sa Chan Hieng, the director of the government office of women affairs, said that Sok Heang has nothing to do with the company expenses, and that she does not need to pay anything back.

Human rights officials claimed that the company’s contract was not done with the authority’s approval, therefore it can be annulled.

Sok Heang and her mother said that the reason she wanted to go to work overseas was because of their poverty.