The leakage of foreign currency from the country has never been addressed till now. The major sectors in the country employ foreign labor who take away much of the tourism dollar earned. The high leakage from the tourism sector itself worsens the staggering situation. A large percentage of the tourism dollar goes to the travel agents, while importing all major essentials including fruits, vegetables and meat for the tourist resorts also adds on to this. Moreover the large number of expatriates employed in resorts also adds on to this. Sadly there are also so many laborers employed, who can be easily replaced by Maldivians. The businessmen are more worried about the immediate profit they gain from employing cheap labor, rather than the long-term impacts of this on the country’s economy.
Another booming industry in the country is the construction industry which too employs foreign cheap labor. While this group of manual labor doesn’t cost much to the loss of foreign money, the heaviest burden is put on by professionals such as doctors, engineers, nurses, teachers, accountants etc.
As I have some experience from the education sector and lot of my friends work in this sector, I would share some of my thoughts. From my days of schooling till now the strangest thing in the Maldivian education system is the “disease” called “tuition” or in other words private tuition. It’s such an irony that even the most intelligent and capable students are either required to undergo private tuition or forced to do so by parents who want their children to do the very best. I believe the tuition culture was a creation from our beloved foreign teachers. Even though a large proportion of these teachers are genuine and working hard to enhance their students’ performance some teachers never make enough effort in their daily routine school teaching. Instead they priorities their tuitions and spend so much time on private tuitions they neglect their classroom teaching. The immense amount of money paid on tuitions is leaked out from the economy and hence will elevate the dollar shortage problems. Moreover these teachers are paid more allowances than local Maldivians doing the same jobs. My suggestion is that all teachers be paid on a packaged basis, which could be revised every 3 years. For instance based on the current situation all foreign secondary teachers can be given a package of ten thousand rufiyaa. Similarly higher secondary teachers can be given 12 thousand and principals can be given 15 thousand. Since there is no way to stop the tuition business of foreign teachers this kind of package pay will lessen the burden on the dwindling economy of the country. A similar package can be given to doctors and nurses and other professionals as well.
Foreign laborers also take on manual jobs which are considered dirty by locals such as garbage collection from households. In my opinion this can also be regulated if a proper municipal waste collection be setup. It will be worth investing a high amount to ensure that on a long run this dollar is not leaked out. For instance a company can do collection at certain times of the day. Male’ can be divided to small regions and collection can be set up. Also special collection vehicles can be designed instead of Lorries or pickups as they are too large to move around some small streets.
Every little effort is worth in a big crisis, like this.
Another booming industry in the country is the construction industry which too employs foreign cheap labor. While this group of manual labor doesn’t cost much to the loss of foreign money, the heaviest burden is put on by professionals such as doctors, engineers, nurses, teachers, accountants etc.
As I have some experience from the education sector and lot of my friends work in this sector, I would share some of my thoughts. From my days of schooling till now the strangest thing in the Maldivian education system is the “disease” called “tuition” or in other words private tuition. It’s such an irony that even the most intelligent and capable students are either required to undergo private tuition or forced to do so by parents who want their children to do the very best. I believe the tuition culture was a creation from our beloved foreign teachers. Even though a large proportion of these teachers are genuine and working hard to enhance their students’ performance some teachers never make enough effort in their daily routine school teaching. Instead they priorities their tuitions and spend so much time on private tuitions they neglect their classroom teaching. The immense amount of money paid on tuitions is leaked out from the economy and hence will elevate the dollar shortage problems. Moreover these teachers are paid more allowances than local Maldivians doing the same jobs. My suggestion is that all teachers be paid on a packaged basis, which could be revised every 3 years. For instance based on the current situation all foreign secondary teachers can be given a package of ten thousand rufiyaa. Similarly higher secondary teachers can be given 12 thousand and principals can be given 15 thousand. Since there is no way to stop the tuition business of foreign teachers this kind of package pay will lessen the burden on the dwindling economy of the country. A similar package can be given to doctors and nurses and other professionals as well.
Foreign laborers also take on manual jobs which are considered dirty by locals such as garbage collection from households. In my opinion this can also be regulated if a proper municipal waste collection be setup. It will be worth investing a high amount to ensure that on a long run this dollar is not leaked out. For instance a company can do collection at certain times of the day. Male’ can be divided to small regions and collection can be set up. Also special collection vehicles can be designed instead of Lorries or pickups as they are too large to move around some small streets.
Every little effort is worth in a big crisis, like this.
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