Riyadh: The kingdom will directly recruit housemaids from Nepal after a deal with the Himalayan country.
In the past few months, housemaids used to come to the kingdom from Nepal via India and Bangladesh.
Sa'ad Bin Nahar Bin Badah, chairman of the Saudi national recruitment committee, said the committee has agreed with Nepal to send housemaids directly from Nepal, adding that according to the agreement, the monthly salary of a housemaid shall not exceed 500 Saudi riyals (about Dh489) and that Nepal shall train the housemaids before sending them to the kingdom.
Breaking 'monopoly'
"The move comes as an actual implementation of the committee's strategy that aims at breaking the monopoly of ... some countries and also to provide citizens with new options in recruiting housemaids with reasonable wages and recruitment costs," Sa'ad said in press remarks published on Saturday.
Earlier Indonesia and the Philippines, the countries that traditionally sent housemaids to Saudi Arabia, increased the wages of their domestic helpers working in the kingdom.
Indonesia asked, among other conditions, that the monthly salaries of maids from the country be raised from 600 riyals to 800 riyals, while the Philippines put the monthly salary of its housemaids at 1,500 riyals instead of 700 riyals.
Sri Lanka, too, implemented similar rules.
Abdullah Al Abdul Lateef, member of the Saudi national recruitment committee at the Riyadh Chamber of Commerce and Industry, was earlier quoted as saying that Sri Lanka decided, effective from early 2008, to have the salaries of its housemaids working in Saudi Arabia increased by about 65 per cent.
Sa'ad said the local Saudi recruitment offices is expected to start recruiting from Nepal within 90 days.
"This is pending the ... training ... in Nepal," he said.
Vietnam agreed late last year to allow its housemaids to work in Saudi Arabia. "The Vietnamese housemaids were recruited [on] a three-year contract on a monthly salary not exceeding 750 Saudi riyals," Sa'ad said.
