Three Saudi ministries meet to raise recruitment fees of expatriates

Riyadh: Efforts are underway in Saudi Arabia to reduce the number of expatriates in the workforce and employ locals in the private sector.

According to the Saudi daily ‘Al Watan', Labor, Interior and Finance ministers met on Saturday and agreed that work permit fees were too low for employers and the policy would have to be reviewed to give incentive to hire more Saudis.

They also discussed subsidising salaries by 50 percent of Saudi teachers employed in civil and private schools. 

A Human Resource fund would help train Saudis to work in the private sector and also be used to subsidize salaries of locals who are employed in private firms.

A minimum wage of 5,600 riyals was instituted this academic year for Saudi teachers. However, complaints arose that it wasn't possible to meet the minimum wage as some salary contracts ranged between 2000-3500 riyals, in which case, the 50 percent subsidy would not be enough to raise the salary to the 5,600 riyal minimum wage.