Manila-Wellington labor meeting a success

More Filipino workers are expected to land jobs in New Zealand following the successful holding of the 1st Philippines-New Zealand Senior Labor Officials Meeting in Manila recently.

Labor Secretary Rosalinda Baldoz said this would pave the way for the implementation of the Memorandum of Agreement on Labor Cooperation which was signed between Manila and Wellington in 2008.

Baldoz said that under the MOA, Wellington would develop a Philippine Special Work Policy which will provide for the employment of Filipino registered nurses, farm managers, and engineering professionals in New Zealand

There are an estimated 31,000 Filipino migrants and expatriate workers in New Zealand, most of them registered nurses, caregivers, engineers, and workers in the telecommunication, government, information technology, manufacturing, dairy, and retail industry.

According to the statistics from the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration, 1,635 OFWs were deployed to New Zealand in 2011, an increase of 16.5 percent over the number in 2010.

“We are really happy that our governments can now extensively share information to better improve each others’ labor systems, labor policies that redound to the betterment of our people, especially on matters like occupational safety and health, on labor standards compliance, and on labor market sharing,” Baldoz said.

The 1st Philippines-New Zealand Senior Labor Officials Meeting was an offshoot of the meeting held between Secretary Baldoz and NZ Labor Minister Kate Wilkinson at the sidelines of the International Labor Conference in Geneva, Switzerland last June.

Undersecretary for Employment Danilo Cruz said that the labor relations between the Philippines and New Zealand formally started in 2008 with the signing of the MOA.

“We are confident that this agreement will significantly increase the number of Filipino workers in New Zealand,” Baldoz said. –Vito Barcelo, Manila Standard Today