Bohol gov't acts to cushion impact on local labor force

TAGBILARAN CITY  ,Philippines — The Bohol provincial government is now preparing to cushion the dire effect of the new US labor policy on the local workforce.

Governor Edgar Chatto had started assessment and planning sessions of Capitol offices, including the Bohol Employment Placement Office (BEPO), to provide assistance and sending Boholanos for work abroad.

BEPO head Romeo Tagaan told The FREEMAN that his office is still coordinating with the Bohol Tourism Office, the Bohol Investment Promotion Center (BIPC) and other public and private agencies that might offer jobs for local residents who would be displaced from the labor market.

Tagaan confirmed that Chatto has been looking for ways to address the effect of the new US policy, and had come up so far with the Bohol-Canada Work (Bohol Can Work) program, a joint effort for employment opportunity for Boholanos to work in Canada instead.

BIPC, for its part, was also hopeful that the P1.6 billion investments and more prospective investments to come to Bohol would be able to absorb Boholano workers for various employment prospects, such as in tourism.

The prospects of Boholanos to get jobs abroad or in the local market, such as in the business process outsourcing or BPO, have dimmed due to the new US policy against importing manpower, such as the tightening of rules on the hiring of nurses from other countries.

US President Barack Obama, in his recent State of the Union Address, has declared his new tack of changing the policy of labor outsourcing.

“We will not go back to an economy weakened by outsourcing, bad debt, and phony financial profits. So let’s change it. First, if you’re a business that wants to outsource jobs, you shouldn’t get a tax deduction for doing it,” said Obama.

The heavily affected industry of this policy are the call centers, and even if Bohol has only a few of these, many Boholanos, who are working at BPOs in Cebu and other cities, would be directly hit with threat of unemployment.

Tagaan said the call center industry could lose employment of up to 90 percent when the US implements its new policy. He cited one of the Caribbean countries that reportedly stopped hiring manpower from other countries and even revoked work permits of foreigners, including Boholanos, already working there because its trading mainly with the US was bad in recent years.

A Filipino-American nurse (whose parents are Boholanos) who used to work double time in Chicago, U.S.A. said that Illinois state had sanctioned nurses like her to avoid overtime to give chance to others, who are underemployed or unemployed.

Tagaan said he hoped the national government will address this problem, contending that call center workers, next to overseas workers, are the largest income earners in the country.