BUKIT MERTAJAM: Lowering business costs and improving efficiency will be the key to helping small and medium enterprises (SMEs) reduce their reliance on foreign workers, says Entrepreneur Development and Cooperatives Minister Steven Sim.
The immediate focus now was to help businesses cope with current challenges, he said, stressing that the government’s target of reducing foreign worker dependency to 10% by 2030 under the 13th Malaysia Plan remained in place.
“We want to ensure Malaysian workers get jobs with decent wages.
“At the same time, we need to ensure entrepreneurs, particularly SMEs, can lower their cost of doing business,” he told reporters here yesterday.
Sim said the government’s priorities were to make more funds available to entrepreneurs, lower the cost of doing business and improve government delivery efficiency.
Efforts to lower costs included reducing bureaucracy and shortening the time needed for businesses to deal with government requirements.
Sim said a special committee chaired by the Chief Secretary to the Government had identified about 55 business licences and permits that had to be renewed annually.
These can now be renewed for periods longer than a year, he said.
“Although this may seem like a small thing, it has a high impact because it reduces the hassle and bureaucracy, particularly for small businesses.
“Instead of getting it renewed every year, it can be done for three or five years,” he said.
It was reported last Thursday that the government wants to lower the number of foreign workers to 10% of the total workforce by 2030.
This is meant to encourage businesses to invest in automation and technology instead of relying on foreign labour.
At present, the cap is maintained at 13%.
Sim said yesterday that the government would facilitate the hiring of foreign workers in sectors that “genuinely” required them, citing jobs that were often considered “dirty, dangerous and difficult”.
However, he stressed that the hiring process must be properly managed.
“We will facilitate businesses taking in foreign workers in an organised manner.
“It cannot be like in the past when there were weaknesses, leakages or human trafficking,” he said.
