Cambodia's labour recruitment firms are set to face stiff new competition after Indonesia signed an agreement to allow migrant domestic workers to seek employment in Malaysia for the first time in almost two years on Monday.

The Memorandum of Understanding ends a protracted deadlock between the two counties over exempting domestic workers from a moratorium Indonesia imposed in 2009.

It stopped all Indonesian workers from taking up jobs in Malaysia because of reported abuses.

Secretary General of the Association of Cambodian Recruitment Agencies, Sok Chanpheakday, said yesterday, the MoU could land a blow to the Kingdom’sn labour industry, which enjoyed a surge in demand after the Indonesia’s moratorium was first imposed.

“The [demand for] migrant Cambodian domestic workers will go down because Malaysia has a demand for Indonesians, they need more Cambodians but the problem is communication, their [Indonesia and Malaysia’s] languages are almost the same,” he said.