DOHA: GCC states are reportedly seeking a unified strategy to address some important issues related to recruitment of foreign workers to the region.
A meeting of the Federation of GCC Chambers in Dammam, Saudi Arabia, last week decided to set up a work team to study in detail the issues and find solutions, a popular regional website reported yesterday, quoting an Arabic daily based in Saudi Arabia. Representatives from all the GCC countries including Qatar attended the meeting, according to the report.
The GCC countries together host about 18 million foreign workers and their number is growing further. The GCC states had earlier discussed a proposal to develop a unified recruitment system for domestic helps, which reportedly was abandoned later.
Quoting Saad Nahar Al Baddah, chairman of the Foreign Recruitment Committee of Saudi Arabia, the daily said that the meeting discussed some practices being followed by the manpower exporting countries that harm the interests of the GCC states.
He identified the problems as the increasing recruitment fees, high salaries being demanded by some manpower exporting countries, faulty job contracts and a failure to give proper training to the newly recruited workers. He said defects in the recruitment system are causing problems to the employers as well as employees.
The meeting agreed to set up a work team under the Federation with representatives from all the member countries, said the report. The work team has been tasked with preparing a unified contract that can be used as a guide by the GCC countries to ensure the rights of both the parties — the employers and employees.
The team will visit the countries that are exporting the highest number of workers to the Gulf region to discuss the problems related to recruitment and make an agreement on possible cooperation.
The unified initiative is intended to spare the member countries of making independent efforts in this regard and to improve the recruitment process as well as the quality of overseas workers. The work team will also visit all the GCC countries and meet with the officials concerned.
The Peninsula
