KUCHING: The Sarawak Timber Association (STA) reiterates that any upward revision of the minimum wage is "unfitting" now as businesses are still recovering from the prolonged containment measures implemented to break the chain of Covid-19 infections in the last two years.
In a statement today, it said many businesses and companies had managed to survive during the Covid-19 pandemic due to the RM18 billion allocations by the federal government to provide wage subsidies, that had benefitted more than 300,000 employers and 2.4 million employees.
Otherwise, the association believed that the number of companies which ceased operations and employees who lost their jobs would be far more than the reported 32,500 companies and 10,000 employees.
STA said one of their pleas to the government during its virtual annual general meeting 2021 in December last year was to be more understanding of the predicament faced by employers, particularly small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and micro enterprises.
However, even before businesses could recover and stabilise, Human Resources Minister Datuk Seri M. Saravanan had said a new minimum wage of "around RM1,500 a month" was expected to be implemented before the end of this year, STA said.
"We are indeed very disturbed by this announcement as the increase in minimum wage will lead to an unwanted domino effect in hiking the cost of doing business, which will undoubtedly be passed on to the rakyat.
"While they may actually be receiving more ringgit in their pockets with the increased minimum wage, their real purchasing power is not growing in tandem. In such a case, the increase in minimum wage will not help to mitigate the rakyat's rising cost of living."
STA said increasing the minimum wage to address the rising cost of living was certainly not an appropriate measure.
It said this endless vicious cycle would prolong economic recovery and be detrimental to the country's economic situation as a whole.
The association said the government has a crucial role to play in stabilising businesses to ensure a steady economic recovery in the country.
Besides, consistent policies that would assist to strengthen businesses are vital during this period, so that the country is able to regain its status as an attractive investment centre.
Malaysia's minimum wage was raised to the current RM1,200 per month from RM1,100 per month previously in February 2020.
