Amkor lays off 1,500 workers

MANILA – ELECTRONICS company Amkor Technology has laid off 1,500 workers from its two plants in the Philippines due to declining orders, a company official said on Friday.

The redundancies are the latest blow to the Philippines’ once-booming electronics sector which has slowed since accounting for over 60 per cent of the country’s exports between August-November 2007.

Amkor Technology (Philippines) laid off the 1,500 workers from its two plants in the towns of Muntinglupa and Santa Rosa near Manila effective Friday, said company vice-president Danny Javelosa.

The company, which makes components for semiconductors, still employs 6,500 workers and is not anticipating further lay-offs, Mr Javelosa told AFP.

He blamed the cuts on declining orders from overseas in the face of the global financial crisis.

The company had already been operating on a shortened work-week since December to avoid any retrenchments but was forced to reduce its workforce by nearly 20 per cent this month as orders remained stagnant, he said.

Staff who had been with the company for almost 30 years were among the redundancies, he said, adding ‘we are giving the people fair compensation for the services they rendered’. The Philippine export sector – particularly the two leading sectors, electronics and garments – has been hit hard by the global financial turmoil.

Many companies in these areas have been forced to resort to retrenchments, shorter work hours or in some cases, outright closure.

The government fears that as many as 60,000 workers in the electronics sector could lose their jobs due to the financial crisis.

The electronics sector employs 480,000 workers. — AFP