Factories in the Parsa-Bara Industrial Corridor are facing a growing shortage of workers as the trend of going abroad for employment has spread in the region. 

There are 1,200 factories in the industrial zone which require around 50,000 skilled and unskilled workers. However, many youths in the region are more inclined to go to India or the Gulf countries to work as the wages are higher there. 

Om Prakash Sharma, senior vice-president of the Birgunj Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said that an exodus of young people to foreign countries had led to the manpower shortage. “If they could be provided skill training and encouraged to work locally, the increased migration could be halted,” said Sharma, adding that  they had long been asking the government to establish technical institutes to provide training.

Meanwhile, the flow of Indian workers into Nepal has also declined as new factories are proliferating in India’s Bihar state. Sharma blamed the government for the decline in industrial human resources. “It is also a result of the government’s failure to develop the Parsa-Bara Industrial Corridor as a special economic zone and establish the necessary infrastructure,” he said.

President Pradeep Kedia of the Birgunj Chamber said the worker shortage could worsen in the future if the migration for foreign employment was not halted. “We are facing a labour shortage even though factories are running single shifts due to longer load-shedding hours,” said Kedia. 

“When they start operating two shifts after the load-shedding is resolved, the labour shortage will become even more acute.” 

According to Kedia, the factories in the corridor employ a total of 5,000-6,000 security guards.

Industrialists say they are compelled to hire Indian workers due to the shortage of Nepali workers. “We employ workers mainly from Bihar who usually have working experience in big factories in Delhi, Punjab, Gujarat and Rajasthan,” said an entrepreneur who wished not to be named.

Factory owners say that they employ Indian workers also because they are more professional and are not interested in joining trade unions. “They are more dedicated to their duty and many factories prefer to employ them,” he said.