As China and Japan hire more Filipino workers, Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) Governor Benjamin E. Diokno sees a further boost in remittances—the country’s top dollar earner.
“China is asking for a lot of OFWs (overseas Filipino workers) from the Philippines because there are many expats in China,” Diokno told the Inquirer.
When he was still head of the Department of Budget and Management (DBM), Diokno said thousands of Filipino workers, including domestic helpers and English-language teachers, were expected to find employment in mainland China amid closer ties between Manila and Beijing.
Diokno said China was willing to hire an initial 10,000 domestic helpers—to be employed under a government-to-government arrangement—to serve expatriates (mostly Westerners) in big Chinese cities such as Beijing, Guangdong and Shanghai.
Since hiring would not be through third-party recruitment agencies, Filipino workers are expected to get “much better” pay rates, Diokno said.
Also, Diokno noted that Japan recently opened up its labor market, with 350,000 jobs up for grabs.
“The Japanese like Filipinos; it’s just a matter of teaching them Niponggo. We have a comparative advantage with Japan because they have a good relationship with the Philippines,” he said.
“Between China and Japan, our OFWs’ remittances would increase,” Diokno said, although the BSP did not have estimates yet.
In a report last April, the World Bank said Japan’s new policy to hire 345,000 foreign workers over the next five years starting April 11 would boost remittance flows to the Philippines and eight other priority countries.
Besides the Philippines, the other countries prioritized by Japan to supply foreign laborers included Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, Thailand and Vietnam.
Migrant workers from these nine countries will be deployed to 14 sectors in Japan that have “severe labor shortages,” the World Bank had noted.
“Both Nepal and the Philippines signed a memorandum of cooperation with Japan on March 25, 2019. The Philippines is seeking to capitalize on the new demand, particularly for skilled workers, and anticipates filling nearly 100,000 of the possible positions,” the Washington-based multilateral said in its April 2019 Migration and Development Brief.
The Philippines was the fourth biggest recipient of remittances from migrant workers in 2018, whose $33.8 billion were behind India’s $78.6 billion, China’s $67.4 billion and Mexico’s $35.7 billion.
Remittances are the country’s biggest source of foreign exchange income, which insulate the domestic economy from external shocks by ensuring steady supply of dollars in the system.
These cash transfers are also a major driver for consumption, therefore contributing to sustained strong economic growth.