Middle East business honcho promises 5,000 nurses jobs

As many as 5,000 nurses in Kerala can look for a well-paying job in the Middle East in the next one year, UAE's Abu Dhabi-based business honcho B.R. Shetty said here Saturday.

Shetty, MD and CEO of UAE Exchange Centre and one who owns the SUT-NMC group of hospitals, said 5,000 nurses will be placed in one year.

Shetty told reporters: "The salary and the working conditions would be the best in the industry. I have full faith in the Kerala nurses because their quality is highly commendable. The number is immaterial. I will be able to provide jobs to any number of nurses and it will be done without any charge."

He said this after an agreement between the Kerala Academy for Skills Excellence (KASE) and the SUT-NMC group of hospitals for setting up the KASE-Centre of Excellence in Nursing in the capital city was done.

Shetty said: "In this centre we will offer highly specialised training for qualified nurses which will extend up to a maximum of six months. World-class value addition to their existing skills will be provided and they will be certified too, which will be accepted worldwide."

Figures provided by the state-owned Kerala State Nursing Council, the body that gives the registration to nurses, revealed close to 20,000 nurses are given registration every year.

Minister for Labour Shibu Baby John said that this skill development programme is the first of its kind initiative being launched by any state government.

He said: "Today we begin with the nurses and our government will now set up 18 similar KASE-Centre for Excellence in various sectors in the next one year. Each and every such programme will be done with a reputed partner. The Nurses Centre of Excellence launched today will very soon tie up with a foreign university. We are finalising the foreign partner as last minute talks are going on with two foreign universities."

John said the efforts of Shetty come at a time when a nurse job in Kuwait costs Rs 1.5 million by way of agency fees and charges. "It's here that Shetty's role is vital as he will eliminate the middlemen as he is doing the job of a facilitator. There will be no charges at all for nurses who are going to be placed by Shetty," added John.

Studies done on the Kerala diaspora by the Centre for Development Studies, here over the years reveal that 15 per cent of the migrants from Kerala are women, of which a huge majority are nurses.

It also points out that with regard to remittances also, the pattern is the same and 20 per cent of the annual remittances is made by women and here again the nurses contribute the maximum.

Today every year, the state receives more than Rs.75,000 crore as remittances from the more than 2.5 million Kerala diaspora, of which around 90 per cent work in the Middle East.