Taiwan recruited 10,906 Vietnamese workers during the first two months of this year, making it Vietnam’s largest labor export market, according to the latest official data from Hanoi.
A total of 17,206 Vietnamese were sent abroad to work in the two-month period, according to a Wednesday report on VGA News, the Vietnamese government-run newspaper Web site, which cited statistics compiled by the Vietnamese Overseas Labor Management Department.
The report said that last month, 8,537 Vietnamese workers were sent abroad, including 5,770 to Taiwan, 1,884 to Japan and 295 to Saudi Arabia.
Taiwan is expected to hire more workers from Vietnam this year as it is planning to end a freeze on the hiring of Vietnamese fishermen, caregivers and domestic helpers.
Minister of Labor Chen Hsiung-wen (陳雄文) on Thursday said that the arrangements for the hiring of Vietnamese workers for such industries could be finalized before June at the earliest.
Authorities from the two sides are expected to hold a meeting at the end of this month to discuss Taiwan’s lifting of a decade-old ban on Vietnamese domestic workers and caregivers, while a ministerial-level meeting between the two sides could take place next month, Chen said.
Due to a serious absconding problem, Taiwan imposed a ban on Vietnamese fishermen in May 2004 and froze imports of Vietnamese caregivers and domestic maids in January 2005, although workers in other categories are not covered by the freeze.
Pending a plan by Indonesia to gradually reduce the number of domestic workers it sends to Taiwan and other nations in the Asia-Pacific region, Taiwan, which has more than 174,000 Indonesian caregivers, has been planning to reinstate the hiring of fishing crew and domestic helpers from Vietnam, as well as introducing workers from other nations.
According to official statistics, of the about 219,000 foreign caregivers in Taiwan, 79 percent are from Indonesia.
ANOTHER EMERGES: The CWA yesterday said this year’s fourth storm of the typhoon season had formed in the South China Sea, but was not expected to affect Taiwan Tropical Storm Gaemi has intensified slightly as it heads toward Taiwan, where it is expected to affect the country in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. As of 8am yesterday, the 120km-radius storm was 800km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan’s southernmost tip, moving at 9kph northwest, the agency said. A sea warning for Gaemi could be issued tonight at the earliest, it said, adding that the storm is projected to be closest to Taiwan on Wednesday or Thursday. Gaemi’s potential effect on Taiwan remains unclear, as that would depend on its direction, radius and intensity, forecasters said. Former Weather Forecast
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