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Manpower Ministry blames trade policy for mass layoffs this year
Deputy Manpower Minister Emmanuel Ebenezer Gerungan said around 80,000 people had been laid off this year, up from last year’s 64,855 people, mostly in West Java.
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Major employer: Employees of a garment company work in a factory in Central Java, in this undated photo. (Central Java Regional Government/-)
The Manpower Ministry has expressed concern over layoffs as a result of imports.
Deputy Manpower Minister Emmanuel Ebenezer Gerungan said around 80,000 people had been laid off at major companies so far this year, up from 64,855 last year, mostly in West Java.
Another 60 companies were expected to conduct layoffs in the near future, Emmanuel added.
“This is a scary thing,” he said on Monday, as quoted by Kompas.com.
Heru Widianto, director of institutions and prevention of industrial relations disputes at the Manpower Ministry, explained that those companies primarily operated in the textile and garment sectors. He estimated the number of layoffs at those 60 firms at up to 10,000 people.
“The [exact] figure of how many more employees will be laid off, especially from those 60 companies, has not been compiled yet […] God willing, our [manpower market] is still okay,” he said on Monday, as quoted by Kompas.
According to Emmanuel, he has received input from both employers and labor unions, who attributed the layoffs to Trade Ministry Regulation No. 8/2024, which eased import barriers and had caused an influx of imported products into the country.
