Govt urged to address labour shortage

At a seminar on the future of Thailand's labour industry, director of the Thailand Development Research Institute (TDRI) Yongyuth Chalamwong raised the key issue of education not responding to the demand of labour, especially since there weren't enough people with advanced vocational certificates that respond to demand.

"The Labour Ministry must talk more with the Education Ministry, economic agencies and private sector to have more manpower in the market. In two to three years, Thailand will suffer from a severe labour shortage, and if we don't solve this, it will be difficult to achieve economic and industry development," he added.

Sakdina Chatrakul na Ayudhya, an academic on labour, said in the next five years the Labour Ministry would be pushed by factors such as unskilled or insufficiently educated workers getting marginalised in an intensely competitive industrial market. He suggested that the ministry start promoting workers' rights by encouraging the formation of labour unions, adding that only 1.3 of the workforce were part of a union at present.

President of the Labour Congress of Thailand Chinchote Saengsang said the problem at the moment was not the shortage of labour but more a lack of labour-management techniques partially due to the ministry's insufficient mechanisms.

For instance, the Employment Department and the Skill Development Department were not able to give people jobs that suited their skills and knowledge, while workers continued suffering from the rising cost of living. He said a long-term policy was needed to take this into consideration, adding that the ministry's master plan should remember that the ministry came into existence due to the labourer's demand for protection.