Myawaddy-Over 200 factories located in Myanmar-Thai border town of Myawaddy have closed and remain shut down, leading to more than 10000 workers being unemployed due to COVID-19.
Majority of the industries are factories and garment factories and due to closure of factories, both workers and owners are at a loss according to Hinin Si Khine.
“For instance, family members of 3 or 4 rely on the sole bread earner and as a result they face difficulty. From the side of owners, they are concerned more about closing of factories. These businesses depend mainly on Thai side and if there is no order, factories will automatically stop. We hope to open within a short time,” said Hinin Si Khine.
In order to control COVID-19, factories in Myawaddy have been investigated by the Health department and department of labour since April 25.
“We inspected factories and most of them are garment factories while some are breweries, purified drinking water factories and snack factories. We instructed them to abide by the instructions issued by the Ministry of Health when re-opened. Currently, they are closed during COVID-19,” said Naing Win Tun from Myawaddy department of labour.
These garment factories were opened in Thailand in the past but moved to Myanmar due to difficulty in accommodation of workers.
Some garment factories are closed since the friendship bridge no-1 has closed as raw materials needed for garment factories were unable to transport to Myanmar.
