Commerce, Industry and Trade Manqoba Khumalo said the country could learn a lot from countries such as the Philippines, who export a large chunk of their unskilled labour to Europe, the United Arab Emirates and other parts of the world.
This was during a tour of the International Trade Department on Friday where Legal Trade Officer Nomalanga Masango told the minister that the issue of exporting unskilled labour was very close to her heart because she was positive that it could boost the country’s socio-economic status.
However, she said a legal framework to formalise this exercise needed to be done and adopted in order to protect emaSwati against human trafficking and other societal ills.
“The Philippines, for example, exported a lot of domestic workers and this has benefitted that country’s economy through rebates that the unskilled workforce sends back to the country,” she said.
She said as a starting point, Eswatini could send the unskilled workforce to countries it had diplomatic ties with, adding that this could ensure the protection of the citizens working in those countries.
Minister Khumalo supported the idea saying, “It is so interesting that only this morning I was attending a business meeting with potential investors and one of those investors was from Mauritius. “He said to me there is a serious shortage of labour in Mauritius such that they have started importing labour from other countries. He wanted to find out if Eswatini had laws that regulated the exportation of labour.”