KUALA LUMPUR (May 9): The number of Malaysian professionals or experts deciding to return home dropped by more than half from 2013, according to TalentCorp's 2016 annual review statistics.

TalentCorp is an organisation under the Prime Minister’s Department in charge of addressing the availability of talent in Malaysia.

One of TalentCorp’s initiatives is the Returning Expert Programme (REP) which facilitates the return of Malaysian professionals from abroad to address the issue of a shortage of professional and technical experts in the country.

The organisation’s annual review revealed there were only 398 approvals from Malaysians who agreed to come back to Malaysia that were received in 2016, 55.8% lower than the 900 approvals received in 2013.

The number of targeted REP approvals for 2013 and 2016 were 1,200 approvals and 800 approvals, respectively.

“The main reason for the return of professionals to Malaysia is usually that their families are based here, and work [or jobs] is second,” said TalentCorp’s chief executive officer Shareen Shariza Datuk Abdul Ghani, when speaking to reporters at a media roundtable today on Whether Malaysia is Prepared for the Future of Work and its Demanding Reality?

“So while we do our outreach efforts, we are not in control of all the other factors that the Malaysian professionals take into consideration, when deciding to relocate,” Shareen adds.

The top five sectors that saw return of Malaysians are oil and gas, financial services, business services, communications and electrical and electronics (E&E), she added.

In 2014, there were a total of 606 REP approvals achieved, while in 2015, the number increased marginally up to 616 REP approvals, before dropping to its 2016 low.

“The decision of the people to return to Malaysia is always their own personal reason, the readiness of them to come back, with mitigating factors such as their children already being settled in school, and [so forth]” she said.

These returning professionals have been away from Malaysia for an average of seven years, Shareen added.

The top five countries that professionals return from are Singapore, China, UK, Australia and the United States, Shareen said, adding that at point of approval, they have a two year window to physically relocate to Malaysia.

“We work closely with companies [in Malaysia] to see what kind of demands they have for our global talent and we connect them with jobs, so their return becomes a bit more assured, in that they have a company that meets their skills set,” she added.

According to TalentCorp’s website, the REP which was introduced in 2001 was aimed at encouraging Malaysians abroad with expertise to contribute their skill sets towards the development of the country, particularly under the Economic Transformation Programme (ETP), by offering both living and financial incentives to easily facilitate the return of Malaysians.

Meanwhile, the issue of a mismatch of talent and its appropriateness for high-skilled jobs in Malaysia is one that many others face globally, even in ASEAN, Shareen added.

“While we have an increased tertiary-level educated workforce, there is a bit of a mismatch in terms of skills, so there is still an issue of unemployment and graduates not filling [and being adequately equipped] for high-skilled jobs,” Shareen said.

“The mismatch of skills is not unique to Malaysia; there are other countries such as Brunei and Indonesia that are struggling with this 'mismatch of skills' issue as well,” she shared.

Malaysia has a high number of middle-skilled workers that are qualified up to diploma or degree level, Shareen added.

She said this has a positive side in that there is a healthy pipeline of middle-skilled workers that have potential to be moved into the high-skilled status, with the correct programmes in place to facilitate this transition.