KATHMANDU, Sept 11: Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal held a meeting with heads and representatives of Nepali diplomatic missions abroad, focusing on labor migration issues and possible solutions on Monday.

Chiefs of Nepal’s diplomatic missions in 13 different countries expressed their views on labor migration issues and possible solutions in their respective host nations.

Secretary at the Ministry of Labour, Employment, and Social Security, Kewal Prasad Bhandari, delivered a brief presentation centering on labor migration issues, explaining the roles that Nepal’s diplomatic missions abroad can play in mitigating these challenges.

The presentations highlighted various multi-dimensional aspects of labor migration, including the current state of the labor market and migration trends, the significance of remittances and their impacts, bilateral labor agreements and understandings, guidelines on foreign employment demand attestations, provisions for shelter and support for migrants, labor permit issues, management of local employees, organizational arrangements, and the status of labor attachés, E-7 visas (specific activity) for South Korea, provisions for Japan's specified skilled workers, and the archiving of labor migrants missing from official records.

The presentation also shed light on relief and rescue operations, charitable efforts, the current status of legal defense mechanisms for labor migrants, labor relations and challenges, issues concerning domestic help and their working conditions, affiliation of migrants with the Social Security Fund, attestation of specified labor skills, training programs, and language proficiency, maximum consultancy fees for labor migration consultants, official channels for the entry and regulation of remittance flows, travel arrangements facilitated by travel agencies, possibilities for new labor destinations, and the expansion of the labor market, among other topics.

The report also includes subjects ranging from issues of domestic workers to the supply of workers as per the agreement between the governments of concerned countries, association with the Social Security Fund, specialized labor skills, training and language testing, service fees for counseling, bringing in remittance inflow through a formal channel, educational counseling, problems in the process of going for foreign employment, the potential of new labor destinations and labor market expansion, and expected achievements and results.

The top 10 destinations for labor immigration for Nepali people are Qatar, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Bahrain, South Korea, Oman, Japan, and Romania. Similarly, the concept paper has identified various problems facing Nepali migrant workers at foreign jobs and offered alternatives.

The interaction will discuss an array of subjects ranging from demand letter verification to cheating in foreign employment, problems facing workers at the workplace, human trafficking, problems facing Nepali workers at foreign jobs without proper documentation, the situation and problems of the free visa and free ticket scheme, e-visa issues, problems with seasonal visas, the effectiveness of diplomatic missions, and methods to make labor immigration safe, respected, and credible.

Also present on the occasion were Deputy Prime Minister and Defense Minister Purna Bahadur Khadka, Minister for Labour, Employment and Social Security Sharad Singh Bhandari, Minister for Foreign Affairs Narayan Prakash Saud, Political Advisor to the Prime Minister Haribol Gajurel, Secretaries of the government, Ambassador of Nepal to Austria Bharat Kumar Gautam, Ambassador to Oman Dornath Aryal, Ambassador to Germany Ramkaji Khadka, Ambassador to Japan Durga Prasad Subedi, Ambassador to South Korea Jyoti Pyakurel, Ambassador to Malaysia Dilli Raj Paudel, and Ambassador to Qatar Naresh Bikram Dhakal.

Similarly, Ambassador to Bahrain Tirtha Raj Wagle, Ambassador to Pakistan Tapas Adhikari, Ambassador to Kuwait Ghana Shyam Lamsal, Ambassador to the United Arab Emirates Tej Bahadur Chhetri, and Ambassador to Saudi Arabia Nawaraj Subedi separately presented their reports on the situation of Nepali migrant workers in their respective host nations and ways to bring changes in the situation.

PM Dahal is scheduled to officially inaugurate the interaction on Tuesday.

RSS

 
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