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Malaysia
This Week in AsiaEconomics

Malaysians could pay more for vegetables as worker exodus sparks supply fears: ‘locals don’t want the jobs’

  • The country’s farms rely on millions of workers from Bangladesh, Indonesia, who return home every year to observe Ramadan with their families
  • Farmers warn the labour shortage could cause a supply slump at a time the government is seeking to limit the flow of migrant workers

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A vendor sells vegetables at a night market in Langkawi, Malaysia. Photo: Shutterstock
Joseph Sipalan

Malaysian vegetable farmers have warned supply could fall by 40 per cent next month due to a labour shortage caused by the annual Ramadan exit of Muslim foreign workers, but exacerbated by a hard May 31 government deadline for new migrant workers to enter the country.

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Millions of workers from Bangladesh, Indonesia and Nepal staff swathes of essential but low-paid jobs in construction and manufacturing, plantations and farms – jobs Malaysians balk at doing.
Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim’s administration wants to change that by limiting overseas worker numbers and encouraging Malaysians to raise their incomes – and allow him to slash the subsidy bill – by taking up domestic jobs instead.

Farmers warn the seasonal shortfall of workers will cause a slump in vegetable production in April, which will be compounded by the government plan to choke off the flow of migrant workers the following month.

“All our farms use foreign workers. Locals don’t want the jobs, and now even foreign workers are picky as most prefer working in factories over the hard work at farms,” said Lim Ser Kwee, the president of the Malaysian Federation of Vegetable Farmers Association, which has 6,000 members.

Lim, who also runs a farm in southern Johor state, said around one-fifth of the estimated 40,000 foreign workers hired by the federation’s members had been expected to return to their home countries during the Ramadan fasting month to beat the Eid rush.

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That could drag output down by 40 per cent at their next harvest cycle next month, he said, adding that workers often took months to return to their jobs.

This means households and restaurants may have to pay more for leafy greens such as spinach and bok choy, which are mainly produced locally due to their short shelf life.

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