Several topics related to expatriate employment were discussed in a forum titled ‘Governance of temporary Foreign labour : Challenges & Prospects’, patronised by the Labour Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA) Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Ausamah Al Absi at Diplomat hotel.

Kingdom’s first forum of its kind was organised by the LMRA in cooperation with the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). It featured 60 foreign employment experts representing local and international organisations, in addition to ambassadors of employment exporting countries, aiming to discuss the current status, difficulties and solutions for this major sector.

Mr. Al Absi urged for more development of the regulations to be compatible with the escalating requirements of global changes.
“Expatriate employments particularly in the GCC states, is a matter of a vital importance,“ said Mr. Al Absi, explaining the need to conduct more researches to find innovative solutions.

The Chairman of Mena Investment Centre’s Board of Trustees and OECD representative Dr. Zakaria Hijris praised the efforts of Bahrain’s government by setting a role model for the other regional countries.

The head of the Migration and Skills Unit of OECD Development Centre Dr.

David Khoudour, stated that Circular Migrants is a very noticeable phenomena in the modern world, where people travel back and forth from all directions seeking work.

“India comes on the top of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) ranking of incoming money transfers, with USD 69 billion being pumped into the Indian economy, transferred by 25

million migrants,“ said the Indian Ambassador to Bahrain Dr. Mohan Kumar adding that 70pc of the six million expatriate Indian employmees in the GCC are from Kerala who transfer USD40 billion to India. “We support maintaining this large economical source and appreciate the cooperation of GCC states on this matter,“ added Dr. Kumar.
The attendees of the forum agreed to set mechanisms to regulate this main sector and to conduct more studies on the expatriate employment, fulfilling all requirements needed to improve this important segment of the community.