Wages in Malaysia need to rise. Period.

This is one way to flush the country down the toilet.

Instead of looking to industry leaders for expertise, our construction industry looks to other third world countries. Yes, I understand we are a small country with a tiny income. But are our companies so poor that they have to compromise on quality?

You can argue that I'm being anti-third world, but the facts are the facts: first world countries have good quality systems, third world countries don't. Answer me: If you're planning to invest RM100 million in a property development, which are you going to choose -- something built on first world systems or third world systems?

It's clear that wages must rise in this country so Malaysian companies can retain home-grown talent, and if need be, attract quality (i.e. first world) talent for our own talent to learn from.

Master Builders Association of Malaysia (MBAM) president Patrick Wong said [...] lack of skilled and experienced talent would cause delays and affect the quality of projects.

About 100 contractors had moved overseas to undertake projects and took with them the local talents, further aggravating the shortage.

He estimated there was a shortage of about 300 project managers, 1,000 site supervisors and 1,000 quantity surveyors.

To solve the problem, many association members were considering hiring engineers from India, Pakistan and the Philippines. [Source: The Star]