KUALA LUMPUR: The palm oil industry loses an annual export value of up to RM7.9 billion due to worker shortage, the Dewan Rakyat was told today.
Plantations and Commodities Minister Datuk Seri Johari Abdul Ghani said: "We are facing a shortage of 40,000 workers, which, if translated into economic value, means that for each worker to harvest one metric tonne per day for 260 days in a year, we have an export value loss of RM7.9 billion."
"Most foreign workers brought into the country are for the industrial, manufacturing and service sectors.
"These workers, if mobilised to palm oil plantations, would ease the shortage of plantation workers.
"However, the problem is that these workers were brought in for the manufacturing and service sectors, so they're reluctant to work in (palm oil) plantations."
Johari was responding to an additional question from Datuk Mohd Shahar Abdullah (Barisan Nasional-Paya Besar) about the labour shortage, which affected the palm oil exports.
"We understand that the Home Ministry and Human Resources Ministry have stopped the quota for the entry of foreign workers.
"(And) we are trying to convince some of them (surplus foreign workers) to work in the plantation sector."
In reply to a supplementary question from Datuk Idris Ahmad (Perikatan Nasional-Bagan Serai), Johari said that for harvesting, there was no technology or machines available to do it (harvesting).
Idris had asked about the use of technological advancement to address labour shortages.
"I agree that mechanisation is good, and while we can use drones for fertilisation, pesticides and precision farming, we have yet to find the technology or machines to harvest fruit.
"We have many tools to harvest fruits. However, we still need skilled harvesters (manual labour).
"So we still rely on foreign workers to do this."
He said the ministry had introduced a Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) course to train locals to become harvesters, which would address the labour shortage in the sector.
"We are training local worker to harvest oil palms and they can earn more than RM3,500 per month."
He said the course, with the first batch of 60 students, would begin in April and end in September."
Earlier, he said the country's average production of crude palm oil (CPO) from 2013 to 2023 stood at 19.07 million metric tonnes annually, while the average production of crude palm kernel oil (CPKO) for the same period stood at 2.20 million metric tonnes annually.