COMMENT | Zuraida, here’s an easy answer to oil palm labour woes

COMMENT | Plantation Industries and Commodities Minister Zuraida Kamaruddin has given some interesting figures in a reply to a question in Parliament. If the figures are right, I offer below a complete solution to the palm oil industry’s labour woes.

This plan I propose will be one that will not only benefit all plantation owners but workers as well who will be so well-rewarded that there will be no need for the industry to import workers anymore. That is if Zuraida’s figures are correct.

According to her figures, Malaysia’s oil palm sector lost an estimated RM10.46 billion worth of unpicked fruit in the first five months of this year because of the ongoing labour shortage.

She added that there was a shortage of 28,940 labourers in the industry, with an estimated productivity of harvesting two tonnes of oil palm fruit a day, which comes up to about 57,880 tonnes of fresh oil palm fruit being unharvested a day, or 1.5 million tonnes a month.

“Based on this calculation, it is estimated that unpicked oil palm fruit due to a lack of labourers in the first five months of 2022 is around 7.52 million tonnes. This comes up to a value of RM10.46 billion, taking into account the average price of oil palm fruit from January to May, which was at RM1,390 per metric tonne,” she said in the parliamentary written reply.

Her plan to resolve this is to encourage plantations to increase the use of machines to reduce dependence on labour, which would also boost productivity and increase workers’ income.

“And it is hoped that this would, in turn, attract more young Malaysians to join this sector,” she said.

However, the harvesting process is notoriously resistant to automation and those in the industry have maintained that harvesting needs to be labour intensive. That need not be a problem though...