The ASEAN Economic Community to be established next year is expected toenable free movement of goods, capital, and skilled labour, a seminarheard in Ho Chi Minh City.

Le Trieu Dung, Deputy General Directorof the Ministry of Industry and Trade's Multilateral Trade PolicyDepartment, said trade between Vietnam and ASEAN member countries hasexpanded rapidly in recent years to top 40.1 billion USD last year.

Theestablishment of the AEC would bring more choices of goods and servicesto Vietnamese consumers and enable Vietnamese companies to expandexports to ASEAN countries because their goods would have zero duty, hesaid.

It would facilitate mobility of skilled labour within thebloc via mutual recognition arrangements (MRAs), a key tool that enablesskilled, experienced professionals to work and ultimately be certifiedin a destination country, he said.

Jae Hee Chang, a specialist onemployers' activities at the Bangkok-based International LabourOrganisation (ILO), said "MRAs aim to promote mobility of skilledprofessionals, attract regional talents to meet staffing shortages,boost regional competitiveness, and improve the quality of servicesthroughout ASEAN."

Under ASEAN MRAs, eight categories ofprofessionals – in medicine, dentistry, nursing, accounting, surveying,engineering, architecture, and tourism - would be able to move freelywithin the region, she said.

She said an ILO survey of regionalemployers on skills and competitiveness, which polled 240 firms in 10countries, found that "most enterprises are optimistic that greaterlabour mobility, lower trade barriers, and free investment flows willboost their competitiveness, but few understand the AEC fully and manyare not ready to capitalise on the opportunities."

It showed thatskill gaps are a major concern across the region since companies findit hard to recruit personnel with the skills they need, she said.

"Thebiggest challenge is that not a lot of enterprises are aware of theMRAs, and, without this awareness, trying to source people from othercountries might be a little bit more difficult.

"In ASEAN right now a lot of low-skilled and medium-skilled labour is going out and coming in."

For Vietnam, the importance of upgrading the skills of the workforce is very important, she said.

Itis vital for Vietnam and other ASEAN members to find a common languagethat everybody can use, especially for education and also at theworkplace, because without a common language or harmonisation ofthinking, it is very difficult to exchange people and ensure labourmobility, she warned.

"The language barrier and culture barrier are very important to address."

Thereis a need for more engagement by companies with the MRAs and inparticular the ASEAN Qualifications Reference Framework, she said,adding that they should be more active in having dialogues with theGovernment and education organisations to reform training curriculums.

NgoDinh Duc, General Director of HR company Le & Associates, saidskilled workers would have more choices in the future, but they mustequip themselves with good English speaking skills and improve theirproductivity and attitude towards work.

To retain talent,employers need to build a good image for their company, offer a goodworking environment and salaries, bonuses, and welfare policies, andinvest more in human resources development strategies, he said.

Thelevel of labour integration in ASEAN remained low, Dung said, addingthat the AEC would have a great impact on the labour market in ASEAN,especially Vietnam.

ASEAN or the Association of Southeast AsianNations comprises of Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia,Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.-VNA