The views expressed in this presentation are the views of the author and do not necessarily reflect the

views or policies of the Asian

Development Bank Institute (ADBI), the Asian Development Bank (ADB), its Board of Directors, or the governments they represent. ADBI
does not guarantee the accuracy of the data included in this paper and accepts no responsibility for any consequences of their use.
Terminology used may not necessarily be consistent with ADB official terms.

8th ADBI-OECD-ILO Roundtable on Labor Migration in Asia

Recent Changes and Development in

Foreign Workforce Policies

Workforce Development Agency

Ministry of Labor, CT
LIAO, Kuei-Yen
CHEN, Hui-Chiang
Jan 30, 2018
 Outline
 Introduction
 Problems of Attracting Talents
 New Policy
 Principles of Foreign Workforce Policy
 New Challenges
 Promotion Plan

2
 I. Introduction (1/3)

 Change in Population Structure and Labor Market

 Low Fertility Rate

Fertility rate has been significantly dropped from 1.57 % in 1989

to 0.82% in 2017.
 Population Aging
The elderly population (above of 65 years old) of the total population
rate rose from 5.3% in 1989 to 13.86 % in 2017. The aging of
population has gradually increase over the last 2 decades.
 Labor Participation Rate
Labor participation rate slightly declined from 60.12% in 1989 to
58.92％ in 2017.
 I. Introduction (2/3)

Change in Higher Education and Work Value

Complicated the Youth Employment Issues
 Growing Higher Education

University graduates increased from 11.65％ in 1989 to

71.40% in 2014.
 Increasing Service Sector
Service Sector Employment increased from 45.01% in 1989
to 59.37% in 2017.
 Significant Youth Unemployment
Youth unemployment rate significantly increased from 1.08％ in
1989 to 12.12％ in 2016.
I. Introduction (3/3)

Challenges
 Difficulty in attracting global talents
 Shortage of skilled labor
 Increasing demand of the long-term caretakers
6
Ratio of Foreign Professionals & Workers

Categories Number(person) %

Professionals 30,928 4.4

Workers 676,142 95.6
Total 707,070 100.0
 7
 Foreign Professionals by
Occupational Categories
Number
 8 Problems of Attracting Talents
Challenges we face
Problems
 Countries’ talent competition
 Lack of effective immigration
 Serious brain drain policies
 Regulation limitations
 Insufficient international
environment
 Insufficient recruiting
measures
 Existing Economic Migration Policy
9

Relax salary restrictions

Make
talents stay Provide high-level R&D work

Make foreign graduates

stay to work

Relax work permit regulations

Recruit
talents
Create friendly international
environment
 II. New Policy

Principle of Foreign Workforce Promotion

 To Attract Foreign Professionals to Work
Making more favorable immigration policies to attract foreign
professionals
.

 To complement the underemployment problem and to

limit the number of foreign worker in industry
Introducing foreign labors to work domestically on the premise
that there is no disruption the local employment market.
 supplement not replacement
III Principles of Foreign Workforce Policy (1/2)
Distribution of Foreign Professionals

Overseas Religious, Sports

Specialized Chinese or artistic, and
Tutoring coach and
or show
class Teacher Foreign athlete
Years technical Investment
business Contract
Total
teacher work
work
Manager

2010 13,981 5,715 2,406 1,644 1,685 1,327 40 26,798

2017
18,293 4,453 2,364 2,634 1,538 1,384 62 30,928
III Principles of Foreign Workforce Policy (2/2)

Distribution of Foreign Workers

Years Total Manufac- Construction Marine Care Taker Household
turing Sectors fishing/ Helper
Netting work

2010 425,660 215,271 3,865 8,670 195,726 2,128

2017 676,142 408,571 5,114 12,300 248,209 1,948
(5.93%) (3.58)) (0.04%) (0.11%) (2.18%) (0.02%)
 IV. Management of Foreign Workforce

Cate-gory Recruit Salary Duration Transfer to Security Transfer

ment range of the a new fees limitation
process employment employer

Foreign None More than 3years Allowable by None No limitation

professionals NTD 47971 (without Work Permit (White-collar
(USD 1600) worker can’t
time limit)
transfer to Blue-
collar worker)

Foreign Yes More than 3years Transfer only Basic: NTD Prohibit to
worker NTD 22000 (It can’t in special 1900 transfer unless
(USD 750) more than circumstances monthly (65 special
except for 12 years.) USD) circumstance
household Vary by
helpers and category
care takers
 V. New Challenges (1/3)

Review National Population and Immigration Policy

 Due to low fertility rate and population aging, working age
population keep declining.
 Retain foreign students and experienced foreign professionals
to meet economic development need.
 V. New Challenges (2/3)
 To Implement the Long-term Care Policy
 Long-term care policy implemented in June, 2017. To cope with
the rising need of long-term care workers, the introduction of
care worker policy should be reviewed.
 Not only to establish the introduction of long-term care worker
policy, but also need to ensure foreign caretakers’ working
quality and working rights.
 To Ensure the Rights and Benefits of Foreign Workers
 Information of Daily living conditions and rights of the foreign
workers should be transparent
 The assistant measures to avoid the employer – employee
disputes should be strengthened
V. New Challenges (3/3)

Demand of Foreign Professionals

 New measures to attract and retain foreign professionals
 The barriers for spouse of foreign professionals to work
should be relaxed.
Continuous Labor Shortage
 Introduce foreign agricultural workers to solve labor
shortage problem in the agricultural sector.
 Take the youth unemployment and the low salary condition
into consideration to manage the reasonable number of the
basic foreign workers.
 VI. Promotional Plan (1/2)
Provide Decent Working Conditions to Attract/Retain
Foreign Professionals
 Formulate favorable policies and decent the working
conditions to attract and retain foreign professionals.
 To relax the regulations for spouse of foreign professionals
to enable them to work.
Review Foreign Worker Introduction Policy
To implement employment promotion policy to
supplement labor shortage issues.
To setup the precautionary system to manage the
number of foreign workers to work domestically.
 VI. Promotional Plan (2/2)

 Review the Long-term Care Policy and introduction of

Foreign Caretaker Policy
 To review the policy about the introduction of the foreign
caretakers.
 To implement the Rest Day Leave Policy for the foreign
caretakers.
 Strengthen the Protection of the Right and Benefits
 Supporting measures needed after relaxing the rule that foreign
workers no need to depart for 1 day when their contract expired.
 To ensure the rights of foreign workers especially to implement
the holiday and rest day leave policy.
 To timely update and ensure the rights and benefits of foreign
workers information received via website and free hotline.
Thank you for your attention.