Malaysia has announced the reopening of the calling visa quota for hiring foreign workers. It is reported that more than 2.45 million workers will be recruited under this scheme.
The country’s Home Minister, Saifuddin Nasution Ismail, made the announcement on Tuesday (19 August), according to leading Malaysian media outlets.
Although Malaysia reopened its labour market on 9 August 2022 after a four-year ban, just seven months later, on 18 March 2023, the then Human Resources Minister V. Sivakumar announced that applications and approvals for foreign worker quotas would remain suspended until further notice.
Nearly two years later, on Tuesday, Malaysia’s Ministry of Home Affairs and Ministry of Human Resources held a joint committee meeting on the issue of foreign worker recruitment, where the decision was taken to reopen the calling visa quota.
Home Minister Saifuddin Nasution Ismail stated that applications will be accepted to recruit foreign workers in 13 subsectors, including agriculture, plantations, and mining.
Within the service sector, recruitment will be allowed in wholesale and retail, land warehouses, security services, metals and scrap materials, restaurants, laundries, cargo handling, and building cleaning.
He further clarified that recruitment in the construction sector will be limited to government projects, while in manufacturing, priority will be given to new investments under the Malaysian Investment Development Authority (MIDA).
For this phase of calling visas/foreign worker recruitment, only sector-based official agencies will be eligible to apply. Unlike before, individual agents or direct employers will no longer be allowed to apply independently. Applications will first be vetted and approved by the Foreign Workers Technical Committee, followed by the Joint Committee.
The Home Minister also confirmed that the current quota of 2,467,756 workers will remain valid until the end of the year (31 December 2025).
After that, the recruitment of foreign workers will be capped at 10% of Malaysia’s total workforce. However, the authorities and media did not specify how many of these quotas will be available for Bangladeshi workers.