PM urges industries to remain careful about workers welfare

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina today urged the local and international entrepreneurs to remain careful about the welfare of the workers 

She said "The employers must ensure working environment in the industries , labour rights and occupational health and safety of workers." 

The Prime Minister urged all to come forward for employment of more women and physically challenged workers apart from taking welfare measures for workers, provide them necessary support and training for development of skills and creation of new employment.

The Prime Minister said this while inaugurating Dhaka Summit on Skills, Employability and Decent Work 2016 at Osmani Memorial Hall here today.

Sheikh Hasina hoped that development partners will increase their cooperation in future as in the past in the arena of efficiency improvement, increase of reliability and creation of decent work environment.

Incentives are not enough, we also need to invest more in capital and technology and human resource development. Most of our product including garments are trapped in low-wage, low quality, low cost, syndrome . "We have to come out from this situation," the Prime Minister said.

At the same time, she said, we have to think how to increase the value addition of our products. If we update designs of our garment products and market those with self-initiative, we would be able add more value, she added.

"We need to prepare ourselves with innovation, creativity and customized production capacity for the future. Only then, we can sustain in the world products and Supply Chain of services. Keeping this fact, we need to match our education system with efficiency," the Prime Minister said.

Sheikh Hasina said national capacity will have to be achieved by skilled labour force as well as through developing skilled managers and skilled professionals. Institutional education must match the needs of industry. Universities will have to produce skilled managers with proper education and training systems, she said.

Bangladesh Employers' Federation (BEF), Ministry of Labour and Employment (MoLE) Government of Bangladesh and National Coordination Committee for Workers Education (NCCWE) are jointly organizing the conference on four thematic areas. 

The areas are- Work and Society, Decent Jobs for all, Organization of Work and Production, and Governance of Work.

Director General of ILO Guy Bernard Ryder, Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid, Minister for Overseas Employment and Expatriate Welfare Nurul Islam, Bsc, State mminister for Labour and Employment Mujibul Haque attended the function as special guests.

Secretary General of International Organization of Employers (IOE) Linda Kromjong, President of BGMEA Siddiqur Rahman, Canadian High Commissioner in Bangladesh Benoit-Pierre Laramee, Director of the World Bank Group's Education Global Practice Amit Dar, Chairman of NCCWE Shah Mohamnad Abu Zafar, President of Bangladesh BEF Salauddin Kashem Khan also spoke on the occasion. 

Considering the importance of skill development in the context of Bangladesh the conference will have a skills agenda towards promotion of decent work, one of SDGs.

Welcoming the participants of the conference the Prime Minister hoped that participating experts will help deliver their valuable opinions on skill development, decent work and employability
in order to resolve the present challenges.

Sheikh Hasina said as a densely populated country with limited resources Bangladesh is in a difficult situation to meet the demand of huge population from agricultural production alone. As a result, its economy has gradually been shifted to manufacturing and service sectors, she said.
 
The Prime Minister said it's essential to establish mills, factories and expand service sectors in order to meet the demand of employment of huge population entering into the workforce every year. Bangladesh needs skilled manpower in every sector to become a middle income country by 2021 and a developed one by 2041.

She said Bangladesh has achieved remarkable improvement in Human Resource Development Index for last few years. The demand of skilled manpower has been changed with the rapid modification of technology and Bangladesh has taken the initiative to fulfill the demand, she said.

Sheikh Hasina said there is no alternative to skill training to create skilled manpower. In view of this the National Skill Development Policy, 2011 was formulated to transform huge population into skilled manpower prepared for international labour market. 

With the support of development partners, our government has been working relentlessly to implement this with our limited resources, she said adding that technical and financial assistance from ILO and other development partners are playing a significant role to implement the government's long-term technical and vocational education and training reform program.

Mentioning the challenge of in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals she said increasing the supply of skilled manpower, creating new employment and income earnings capacity will help us alleviate poverty and achieve other social indices to the desired level. 

The Prime Minister said her government is working relentlessly to create new employment with new initiatives to encourage trade facilitation, reducing the cost of capital, infrastructure, uninterrupted power supply and so on.

In this regard she pointed out the initiative to establish 100 Economic Zones across the country that were taken for establishment of new industries, improve port facilities and strengthening regional and sub-regional cooperation.

To bring about dynamism in the implementation of the government's activities, the process of digitalization of the mills and factories is underway, she said adding that harmonized industrial relations, workers' rights and welfare of labor have been initiated on various programs such as formation of labour welfare foundation fund, insurance programs in the informal sector.

The Prime Minister said Safety and Inspection Department has been strengthened to ensure the better working conditions of factories along with strengthening the Wage Commission.

Workers of the Export Processing Zones got the right of Trade Union. The Bangladesh Labour Act has been amended to protect labour's rights, the Prime Minister said.

Sheikh Hasina said Bangladesh has been implementing various programs aimed at improving education and skills such as technical and vocational education and training system reform, action-tailored and internationally recognized training system, new workplace skills training in the scope of expansion.

Expansion of vocational education and training, creation of new infrastructure, modernization and capacity building of the institutions growth, disabled and women friendly environment are taken care of by forming National Skill Development Council (NSDC), she said.

Climate change, technological change, mechanization of agriculture and conversion of labour demand are heavily influencing the national economy making the demand for efficient manpower undeniable, the Prime Minister said.

Source: BSS