Asia Times: Recession locks unskilled Thais into vicious circle



	August 11, 1999	atimes.com

Southeast Asia

Recession locks unskilled Thais into vicious circle
By Prangtip Daorueng

BANGKOK - Many jobless Thais who flocked to villages at the height of the Asian economic recession are now returning to the cities - only to find that employment prospects there are as bleak as they were before.

Salaries and working conditions in many cities are in a less-than-stellar state, with those people lucky enough to find work landing jobs that pay poorly. Many of those used to providing unskilled labor have to compete with more job seekers, and workers find themselves with no choice but to accept whatever job is offered to them.

This does not sit well with workers, including the 5,000 employees who have been demanding bigger pay hikes in front of the Triumph underwear factory in Samut Prakarn province, east of Bangkok. Protesting the factory owners' decision to cut their yearly salary increases from 8 to 6 percent, the employees are part of the first worker demonstration after the chaotic period of company lay-offs and factory shutdowns due to the recession that began in July 1997.

Analysts say their action indicates that the initial signs of economic recovery might be useless if some deep-rooted problems relating to skills upgrading, working conditions and benefits and poverty are not solved.

Likewise, the effects of the crisis on laborers have highlighted the value of a welfare system for workers. Many Asian countries hit by recession did not then, and do not now, have adequate worker welfare systems and often rely on traditional structures such as families in times of trouble - but this may not be enough.

''Only a good welfare system for the unemployed helps,'' said Somyot Pruksakasemsuk of the Center for Labor Information Service and Training (CLIST), a Bangkok-based non-governmental organization. ''Thailand lacks a safety net for those who are unemployed because of the crisis. We need such a system, otherwise the old vicious cycle of labor problems will return.''

Experts say more labor tensions can be expected if the millions of unemployed, who earlier moved back to the villages amid the government's call for self-reliance through agriculture, decide to head for the cities. Many urban refugees have been unable to make ends meet in the villages and have no workers' welfare scheme to tide them over, and so go back to the cities to look for jobs.

But the situation in the cities is no better than when they left, Somyot says. ''In some industrial areas in Ayutthaya province, the ratio of applicants for one job position is as high as 200 to one,'' he pointed out. ''They [workers] consider themselves lucky enough to be hired again. But this will lead to the future labor problems when workers realize that they are being treated unfairly.''

The official number of unemployed people in Thailand this year stands at 1.7 million people, up from 1.2 million before the Asian crisis as of early 1997. Others, however, say 2 million people or more is a more realistic figure.

Obviously, the villages were not a real solution for factory and other workers who sought shelter there. Lack of land ownership among small farmers often led to a less-than-productive situation for typical villagers and even fewer opportunities for returning workers from the cities. Likewise, the unemployed, who used to be sources of income for relatives back in villages, often became a burden to those same families.

At a recent seminar in Bangkok, Wichean Ratanapeerapong, the head of the land department, conceded that majority of land in Thailand belongs only to a small group of people. Statistics of the department show that about 90 percent of Thai people owns less than one rai (0.4 acre) each. Those who own more than 100 rais (40 acres) each make up only 10 percent of the population of 60 million people.

On the village level, about 30 percent of villagers have no land deeds while more than 500,000 families still depend on others' land for a living.

Moreover, Thailand, a country that covers a 320.7 million rai (128.28 million acre) area, has now used up all 168 million rai (67.2 million acres) of agriculture space. According to the land department, the country cannot further expand its agricultural areas, so the only option is to put the existing agricultural areas to better and more efficient use.

As the situation in the villages pushes the unemployed back to towns, more problems await them there.

''Because most of them are unskilled workers who haven't been trained in the higher level of work, they still have to look for the same job they used to do during the period of economic boom. They have to accept a lower salary. And for those who are still looking around for work, they have no choice but to wait,'' lamented Somyot.

The lack of skilled labor has been an issue in Thailand for a long time, but analysts say government agencies have been be slow to keep up with the times. A study by the Thailand Development Research Institute on skill demand in the industrial province of Samut Prakarn confirms this point. It says skills training for workers, by both government agencies and the private sector in the province, have failed to respond to market demand.

For example, while demand for textile workers has increased to 62,000 workers due to the textile export market, training units have able to produced only 2,500 workers. While the demand for machine technicians has decreased by 50,000 people, training agencies still put this area as their second most important priority.

Another study about the poor, done by Witchin Ravivong, secretary general of Issan (Northeast) Development Association, shows that many job creation projects in the villages do not work because of corruption. This translates into failure in decreasing unemployment in the countryside.

The study, which focused on three groups, the poor who live in big cities, the village poor and the unemployed, also reveals the other social consequencies of income poverty.

For instance, it points out that the unemployed in the cities tend to suffer more health problems due to stress, compared to those in unemployed in the villages. But more children of the village poor have to leave school.

Half of each of the three study groups, composed of 300 people each, reported having conflicts in the family. The majority of those who were laid-off went back to the villages, only to wait for jobs in town. Some of the young unemployed have problems with alcohol and gambling. Labor experts say these are just some of the signs that more than just Asia's recession, Thailand continues to face the basic problem of poverty.

''The same kind of worker demonstrations against payment cuts [in Samut Prakarn] will continue and the unemployment problem will not go away if society doesn't provide a way out for the poor,'' Somyot explained. ''It is time for the government to invest in unemployment welfare that will at least help the jobless to survive.''

(Inter Press Service)

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