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Thai workers express worries over unemployment on Labor Day

Xinhua, May 1, 2017 Adjust font size:

Thai workers expressed their worries over unemployment on a Labor Day parade Monday as the country emphasizes innovation and the appliance of technology.

Several workers were in a strange silver paper suit, imitating robots, with a sentence on them reading "I come to kill workers" during a parade from Bangkok's Democracy Monument to the building of United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP)

A female worker even said on a stage that she is against the introduction of machines in manufacturing.

"We cannot reject technological development, the loss of jobs caused by technological change is already happening, so it has effects on employment," Sawit Kaewvarn, president of Thai Labor Solidarity Committee, said to Xinhua.

Sawit thus asked the government to consider how to deal with the unemployment caused by technological development and have some policies to help those affected instead of solely saying that the introduction of new technology is good.

Workers also asked the government to increase the minimum wage, to provide better social welfare and to stop the reform of state-owned enterprises in the parade held by the Thai Labor Solidarity Committee and the State Enterprise Workers Relations Confederation

Thai Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha on Monday asked all workers not to worry about unemployment under Thailand 4.0 strategy.

Prayut said the government is responsible to promote equality among workers and increase employment of Thais as well as take care all 70 million people of Thailand.

"If someone does not have a job, the government, more or less, will help the person to find one," He added.

Prayut also emphasized that Thailand 4.0 strategy will not cause unemployment, but it is a strategy to reform Thailand's economic structure. Enditem