MALAYSIA has re-opened the foreign worker intake with priority given to the oil palm plantation sector, Hamzah Zainuddin said.

“Agriculture will be given 32,000 new foreign workers. This is for the oil palm sector,” the Home Minister told Dewan Rakyat during the Minister’s Question Time (MQT) this morning.

He said a new standard operating procedure (SOP) would be given to other sectors.

“This (SOP) will be decided by the Home and Human Resource ministries,” the Larut MP said.

He added that the government was still reviewing the number of foreign workers that would be allowed for the different sectors.

“The foreign worker quota (according to industries) will be determined by the Human Resource Ministry,” Hamzah said.

Hamzah also said that as at December 31, 2020, 11,751 employers and 212,926 undocumented foreign workers had applied for work permits

He said the applications were from the manufacturing (65,484), construction (122,075), plantation (7,176) and agriculture (12,003) sectors.

“These workers have applied to the government so that the employers can re-hire them,” said Hamzah.

He said the undocumented foreign worker recalibration has already reached 147,705 workers and collected RM71.3 million in compounds.

The minister was responding to Steven Choong’s (Tebrau-Ind) question on which sectors are allowed to hire new foreign workers and the legalisation of undocumented foreign workers. – November 2, 2021.