Malaysia to Hire 2.5 Million Foreign Workers, Great Opportunity for Bangladeshis

Malaysian Home Minister Saifuddin Nasutin Ismail has announced that the government has decided to reopen applications for foreign worker quotas, but only for specific sectors and sub-sectors. He also stated that 2,467,756 foreign workers will be hired.

Following a joint committee meeting between the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Ministry of Human Resources, Saifuddin said that applications would be reopened on a "case-by-case" basis for three sectors and 10 sub-sectors, based on proposals from the relevant ministries. The approved sectors are agriculture, plantation, and mining, which also include all their related sub-sectors.

He made these remarks at a press conference on Monday (August 18) at the M Resort & Hotel in Bukit Kiara.

Separately, under the services sector, the sub-sectors permitted to apply for foreign workers include wholesale and retail, warehousing, security, scrap metal, restaurants, laundry, cargo handling, as well as cleaning services.

Additionally, in the construction sector, applications will only be accepted for government projects, while in the manufacturing sector, only new businesses with investments under the Malaysian Investment Development Authority can apply.

Saifuddin said the practice of allowing "Tom, Dick, and Harry" to apply for quotas will no longer be tolerated. Previously, employers, agents, and anyone could apply, but now they cannot.

He stated that companies in the relevant sectors and sub-sectors must first submit their applications to the Technical Committee on Foreign Worker Management through their respective ministries, which will include deputy secretary-generals from those ministries.

He further explained that plantation directors will submit applications to the Ministry of Plantation and Commodities; agriculture directors to the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security; and restaurant owners to the Ministry of Domestic Trade and Cost of Living.

Saifuddin said this technical committee would vet the applications and then present them for final approval at a joint committee meeting co-chaired by him and Human Resources Minister Steven Sim.

He added that the meeting agreed to set the sectoral ceiling for foreign workers at 2,467,756 for 2025. The joint committee will work to meet 10 percent of this target by the first or second quarter of 2026.

It is worth noting that Malaysia's labor market was reopened for Bangladeshi workers on August 9, 2022, after a four-year ban, with the first 53 workers being sent. Seven months later, on March 18, 2023, the then Human Resources Minister, V. Sivakumar, announced a suspension of quota applications and approvals for foreign workers until further notice. This suspension was in effect until August 19, 2025.