The government has brought 15 new industrial sectors under wage regulations with the aim of ensuring minimum wages for thousands of workers engaged in these industries.
With this inclusion, the total number of formal industrial sectors covered under wage regulations has been increased to 57.
The newly included sectors are private clinics, hospitals, and diagnostic centres, fertiliser factories, brickfields, private airlines, producers of electric and electronic goods, ceramics, cement, batteries, poultry, commercial amusement parks, dry fish producers,聽 stone crushing, IT parks, colour and chemical factories, and milk products and dairy farms.
Among these 15 sectors, the government has already established separate wage boards to determine minimum monthly wages for workers in four sectors 鈥� ceramics, cement, battery production and poultry.
A wage board official mentioned that they were awaiting the formation of 11 additional boards, which required the appointment of representatives from both workers and employers.
Labour secretary AHM Shafiquzzaman said that the inclusion of 15 industrial sectors to the formal wage framework would benefit thousands of workers across the country.
He said that the initiative had been taken with the aim of upholding the rights of workers.
The labour secretary also mentioned that many other informal sectors would gradually be brought under the formal wage regulations.
Labour ministry officials said that workers in these sectors currently received wages at varying rates, even within the same sector, without any structured framework.
They also said that due to lack of formalisation there was no government monitoring in place in the sectors.
According to the labour ministry officials, the establishment of minimum wages would ensure workers a lawful wage structure, prohibiting employers from paying less than the government-set minimum.
They said that inclusion under the wage framework would also grant workers access to additional legal benefits.