With the lifting of the 27-year-old guarantee bond requiring Singaporean employers to hire Filipino migrant workers, the Department of Migrant Workers (DMW) announced on Thursday, Sept. 8, that there is already 10,000 job orders awaiting for overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) in Singapore.

DMW Secretary Susan Ople said the goodwill arising from President Bongbong Marcos Jr.'s state visit led to more and better job prospects for Filipino workers.

The DMW and Singapore's Ministry of Manpower (MOM) earlier announced the cancellation of a banker's guarantee and performance bond of S$7,000 to Singaporean employers when hiring Filipino workers. This equates to 284,140.79 when convert to the prevailing currency of P40.58.

"Even prior to the President's visit, our Labor office in Singapore had already approved close to 10,000 job orders with 5,000 jobs awaiting aircraft technicians in the aviation industry," said Ople on the sidelines of Marcos' state visit to Singapore.

Ople said the newly approved job orders were referred for immediate documentation to the Philippine Overseas Labor Office (POLO) in Singapore, which is expected to be signed into formality in the next few months.

The approved job orders submitted by Singaporean employers to POLO are as follows:

Aviation industry - 5,000 aircraft technicians
Medical industry - 3,000 healthcare workers
Engineering industry - 1,000 skilled workers
Education industry - 500 workers
I.T. sector - 300 workers

Ople is hoping for a big boost in demand for OFWs with the success of President Bongbong Marcos' state visit to Singapore.

"Compared to other countries that also deploy migrant workers, our processing time takes months instead of weeks but with digitalization and given the remarkable talent and dedication of our workers, we expect a surge in demand for OFWs not only in Singapore but also in other parts of the world," Ople said.