Turn brain drain into brain bank

THE recent revelation by the government that there is a stark shortage of professionals in Malaysia, especially in high-tech industries coveted by foreign investors, has set alarm bells ringing.

This worryingly coincides with a troubling exodus: over 1.75 million Malaysians, a third of them highly skilled, now call foreign shores home. And in the last two decades our skilled diaspora has tripled in size, with the Human Flight and Brain Drain Index at globaleconomy.com painting an even bleaker picture of a worrying jump in numbers from 2022 to 2023, exceeding both pre-pandemic levels and the global average.