DOLE to put up 4 new labor offices abroad

In a bid to beef up protection for Filipino workers abroad, the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) will set up four new Philippine Overseas Labor Offices (POLOs) in four “strategic" overseas territories. Labor Secretary Arturo Brion on Sunday said the four new POLOs will be set up in Australia and New Zealand, western Canada, Ireland, and Central China. Brion, in a statement on the DOLE website, www.dole.gov.ph, said the four new POLOs are crucial since the areas he mentioned have “few or no POLOs." He added global OFW deployment now reaches one million annually, and that some eight Filipinos, both temporary and permanent migrants, are now based overseas. “For instance, Canada is so large, and the demand [for OFWs] in western Canada is so big, we need an additional labor attaché there," he said. China is also so large that another POLO must be established to cover the central area together with the two existing posts in Hong Kong and Macau, he added. As for Australia and New Zealand, he noted the need for a POLO amidst the long term growth in the emerging documented OFW markets there. Brion also emphasized the need to put up another post for the first time in Ireland where OFWs, especially overseas Filipino medical personnel, have attained “a very strong presence." DOLE figures indicate that Ireland hosted a total of 5,439 documented OFWs last year, at the same time that the deployment of OFWs in Canada grew by 78.2% (+2,839) to 6,468 from 3,629, and in Australia by 295.5 percent (+1,732) to 2,318 in 2006, from 586 in 2005. The Hong Kong special administrative region in China hosted 96,929 OFWs last year. “These are our emerging labor markets that will sustain deployment in the years to come," he said. At present, Brion said there are 34 POLOs providing necessary protection and other pertinent services to OFWs in strategic areas with productive OFW presence. These include including Abu Dhabi, Bahrain, Brunei Darussalam, Brussels, Dubai, Geneva, Greece, Hong Kong, Israel, Jeddah, Jordan, Kaohsiung, Korea, Kuala Lumpur, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Macau, Madrid, Milan, Oman, Qatar, Riyadh, Rome, Saipan, Singapore, Taichung, Taipei, Tokyo, Toronto, and Washington D.C. Brion said the presence of POLOs onsite ensures OFWs with protection, such as facilitating onsite services that include welfare, and providing complaints assistance against abusive employers, visitation, humanitarian help, among others. But he emphasized that while the OFWs continue to be globally preferred and in continuous demand worldwide, the main policy of the country is not marketing, but the protection of Filipinos who have opted to pursue the work opportunities abroad. - GMANews.TV