Why a TWSP for Arabic language program?

A Concept paper on the proposed Training for Work Scholarship Program on the Arabic
Language program

1. Rationale:

The Philippines is currently beset by a number of problems which is most

pronounced by lack of jobs in the country. Middle East plays a vital role in the
economic survival of the Philippines. It accounts for most of our oil to run vital
industries in the country; at present it is the largest single employer of OFWs - 3.5
million of them. The last remaining avenue for the majority of Filipinos to uplift their
economic lives is to work as overseas contract workers and at the rate that the
economy is going, the country will never cease as a labor exporting country in the
next thirty (30) years.

However, if we will not institutionalize some measures that will ensure the
sustainability of our edge over our competitors, we might lose this labor opportunity
in the next ten years. Right now in the Middle East, our OFWs are facing stiff
competition from skilled workers coming from Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia,
India, among others, and their edge over the Filipino worker is that they speak
Arabic. In fact, these competitors are fast getting our job markets which are
traditionally intended for Filipinos. Most of our employers in the Middle East don’t
speak English but speak only Arabic. In addition, most of the legal cases involving
Filipinos stem from cultural and linguistic differences due to the language barrier.

Because of this, if we want to sustain our labor niche in the next scores of years,
study of the Arabic language should be mode a must for the OFW who intend to
work in the Middle East.

Lastly, the raison d’ étre why Arabic is made one of the major languages spoken in
United Nations is because of the geopolitical and economic importance of the Middle
East, which makes it a prime reason why budding diplomats brush up to learn Arabic
as an additional language.

2. An overview of the Middle East labor market

1. Economic factors

Records indicate that one of the largest job markets in the country is working
abroad. According to statistics a large chunk of Manpower is still the Middle East
and considering that the salaries are paid in US dollars, the bigger incentive for
the workers right now is to focus their destination in the Middle East. This is
 enough justification for the government to focus on equipping our OFW with a
sufficient command of the Arabic language. Learning Arabic would be the KEY
factor to preserve our employment gains on the Middle East. This should be
made as a “strategic component” to maintain our absolute advantage over our
competitors from other countries.

2. Manpower distribution

According to a 2000 report by the Commission on Filipino Workers that around

2.98 million (3.5 million CY 2006) are overseas Filipino workers in the Middle
East and that roughly
1
half of these numbers (1.94 million) are classified as
undocumented.

As overseas migration had absorbed a significant amount of labor, most of these

emigrants are workers engaged in contract work in the Middle East and to a
lesser extent elsewhere. Although some were professionals, majority were in
production, construction and equipment workers or operators, as well as service
workers. Inasmuch as wage paid for overseas contract work have been a
multiple of what2 Filipinos could earn at home, such opportunities have been in
great demand.

Looking from a vantage point of view in a survey conducted by the National

Statistics Office last 2004, the data on the Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs)
taken from April to September 2004 has shown that in such a short period of time
the numbers of OFWs has increased to 1.06 million, and among the 820,000
OFWs, the largest number was in Saudi Arabia with 29.3 % showing that Saudi
Arabia remains the favorite destination
3
of Male OFWs (172,000) of which 33.4%
are laborers and unskilled workers.

3. Government and legal factors

The government’s response here is the formation of the Overseas Workers

Welfare Authority (OWWA) as well as other line agencies that cater to the legal
and other domestic needs of the OFWs. Another is the Pre-departure Orientation
Seminar (PDOS) which in one day tries to jam-pack the needed information to
acquaint workers with the dos and don’ts in the Middle East. Our experience
today would proved that these measures are not enough to sustain the
competitiveness of our OFWs. A strategic approach is needed to sustain our
competitive edge calling for a paradigm shift in government program, and that is,
helping our Middle East bound OFW to require skill in functional Arabic. Right
now, due to the inability to understand the complex culture in the Middle East, the
Workers are faced with a number of factors, among them domestic abuse and
salary delays, which at times results to incarceration for various infractions of the
law.
3. Survey of Institutions offering Arabic language instruction:

In a brief survey conducted by the Institution to determine the presence of other co-
institutions offering said language, it has been noted that the only institutions that
offer Arabic instruction in Metro Manila are classified into several categories:

• Language centers which offer a special Arabic course which duration lasts for at
least ten months. However, it has been noted that the instructors in these
institutes are non- Arabs who have non-Arab accents that neutralize the various
important Arabic vocal intonations which are necessary in learning the language.
Their stress is primarily on the language grammar and access to these types of
institutions is rather limited due to the high cost of tuition to enroll.

• Academic institutions like the University of the Philippines which offers four
semester course study in Arabic, however the stress is mainly on classical
Arabic which is more academic and is not suited to daily and business purposes.
The course is too lengthy for ordinary OFW.

• Religious institutions like Madarris and Masajids which of course appear

unpalatable to Christians for fear of proselytizing and evangelization into
converting to Islam, in addition to the general nation that these places are
breeding ground of terrorism.

Thus in a nutshell it can be gleaned that no technical institution is available that

offers the much needed instruction in Arabic Language as well as the introduction to
the Middle East culture and traditions. Hence, TESDA should provide a national
training program to accommodate and prepare our OFW for work in the Middle East.

4. Desired Government Interventions:

As the continued development of the labor market continues, its impact on the
country’s economy becomes more significantly profound. Thus it is indeed safe to
say that within the next three decades, the country will still rely heavily on OFW
remittances to sustain the economy and increase its Gross Domestic Product
(GDP). The government, as a standard policy, must create mechanisms to ensure
that the growing trend of the Philippine economy must be addressed and sustained.
From a Vantage viewpoint, as the Middle East becomes a prime destination of
OFWs and Arabic being the medium of communication in that part of the globe, the
government should focus its efforts in the creation of training programs in the Arabic
language for overseas contract workers. A viable program would be the creation of a
TWSP in Arabic to ensure that our OFWs bound for the Middle East would be able
to be fully prepared for the language and cultural conditions in the said destination.
5. Availability of Arabic Training Centers:

As of the moment, there are language training centers that focus either on the
classical or the colloquial language and the majority of them appear unacceptable to
our OFWs as the duration and the charges are quite unaffordable. As of the
moment, there is only “one (1)” TESDA accredited Arabic language training centre
which is based in Quezon City, the Asian Academy of Business and Computers,
which offers the crash course in Arabic for six weeks at seven thousand pesos (PhP
7,000.00).

6. Training Needs Analysis (TNA)

1. Current PDOS Setup

A look at the current Pre-Departure Orientation Seminar (PDOS) would show that
the one day PDOS is insufficient considering the complexities of the new
environment and culture they would find themselves into. Thus a longer period of
training or orientation is required to ensure that they would be able to learn and
yet it shouldn’t be long enough that they would be able to grasp and learn the
complexities of the culture of their host country, and at the same time, it should
not be long enough to avoid consuming much of their time, money and effort
attending lengthy training.

2. Proposed Components of the Arabic language Course (ALC)

The contents of the ALC would include the following:

b.1. Introduction to Arabic and Islamic Culture

b.2. Introduction to Arabic Literacy
b.3. Five (5) Elements of the Arabic language

1. Listening
2. Reading
3. Pronunciation
4. Vocabulary
5. Conversational

b.4. Practical application and evaluation

1. functional conversational at home and at the workplace

2. familiarization of various household /workplace equipment and their usage
3. Functional computer literacy in Arabic (for computer based workers)

3. Evaluation
 Students will be then subjected to a rigid evaluation exam to ensure that they
have thoroughly learned all the skills necessary for the course.

7. Projected Beneficiaries
Market Profile:

The target market of the TWSP in Arabic are potential job applicants in the Middle
East, those who are currently applying for a job in the Middle East, and students who
are enrolled in courses that job market in the Middle East. The profiles of the target
market of the school during its “initial course” of operation are as follows:

• About 90% of its market is between the ages of 18-28.

• Male and Female.

• Majority comes from middle and lower middle class families who have average
IQ and are technically inclined for vocational jobs

• Majority lives in Quezon City and the surrounding areas.

8. Conclusion

As such, the implementation of a TWSP in Arabic would ensure that OFWs being
sent to the Middle East are not only linguistically prepared but also culturally and
technically ready to meet the demands of their work, cultures, traditions and
environmental concerns, in the Middle East.

REFERENCES FOR FURTHER READING:

Gender Promotion Office International Labor Office, Vienna

GENPROM Promotion Working Paper No. 8 PHILIPPINES: GOOD PRACTICES FOR
THE Filipina Woman Migrant Workers in Vulnerable Jobs.
www.ilo.org/public/english /enployment/gems/download/swmphi.pdf

Migration News Vol. 2 No. 4, December (1995). Labor Exporters Plans for Emigration.
http://migration.ucdavis .edu/MN/more.php?id=827_0_3_0)

Ozden and Schiff. (2006). International Migration Remittances and the Brain Drain;
editors, World Bank, New Avenue, New York,

The Commission on Filipino Workers (2000).

http://seasite.niu.edu/Tagaloog/Modules/Modules/Models/PhilippineEconomics/
ofws.htm:

2004 Survey on Overseas Filipinos (SOF)

www.census.gov.ph/dat/pressrelease/2005/of04tx.htm/

1 Overseas Filipino workers:

http://seasite.niu.edu/Tagalog/Modules/Modules/PhilippineEconomics/ofws.htm :
The commission on Filipino Workers(2000) report that:…..of the 7.29 M overseas Filipino Workers….2.98 Middle
East million are overseas Filipino workers in the Middle East 1.94 million are classified as undocumented. The
Top…….destination for overseas Filipino workers…are Kingdom of Saudi Arabia…..(para 3)
2 2 http:www.country-data.com/cgi-bin/query/r-10464.html
Overseas migration absorbed a significant amount of labour……….most emigrants were workers engaged in
contract work in the Middle East and to a lesser extent elsewhere. Although some were professionals, majority were
in production, construction and equipment workers or operators. As well as service workers….Inasmuch as wage
paid for overseas contract work have been a multiple of what Filipinos could earn at home , such opportunities have
been in great demand.( Para 8)
3 3 2004 Survey on Overseas Filipinos (SOP)
www.census.gov.ph/data/pressrelease/2005/of04tx.htm/
overseas Filipino workers (OFW’s) in April to September 2004 reached 1.06 million….among the 820 Thousand
OFW’s, the largest number was Saudi Arabia with 29.3 %....Saudi Arabia remained the favorite destination of Male
OFW’s (172 Thousand) of which …….33.4%.........were laborers and unskilled workers
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