irl to enter australian mining services market

This article in The Australian highlights the shortage of skilled labor in Australia and how its being substituted with foreign skilled labor. This MOU with Luminous is the next big opportunity for IRL to build substantial mining services revenue and profit with a highly skilled low-cost Indian labor force.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/industrial-relations/bosses-tap-into-foreign-labour-in-double-edged-boom/story-fn59noo3-1226160671243

WHEN Todd Raffen launched his business in 2003, he could post an ad for a skilled tradie and expect 12 reasonable applications.

These days he counts himself lucky if he gets any.

"We advertise and advertise and we get nothing," Mr Raffen said.

The 36-year-old, who customises truck components for local government and the mining and energy industries from premises in Orange, 250km west of Sydney, believes the shortage of skilled workers is the biggest challenge facing his business and others like it.

"We've always got open vacancies - we would take four extra people right now if we could, but we just can't find the staff," he said.

"All the good workers are going into mining. We want mining - we wouldn't be as big as we are without it - but it's a double-edged sword."

Mr Raffen says labour shortages have worsened and the quality of local applicants has declined in recent years as the mining boom ramps up.

About 18 months ago, Mr Raffen and his wife, Jenny, whose family business employs 26 staff, welcomed their first foreign worker, Korean welder Mo Young Kang.

Recalling his decision to tap the overseas labour market, Mr Raffen said: "I was just thinking that we couldn't ensure our growth would continue if we didn't have staff."

The couple's business, Almighty Industries, has had annual growth of 38 per cent, averaged over the past eight years.

Mr Kang, 41, from Seoul, came to Australia in 2004 to study English. After travelling back and forth several times, he secured a Regional Sponsored Migration visa through Almighty Industries.

"The pay is much better and the conditions are much better in Australia," Mr Kang said.

Mr Raffen, who has since employed two more Koreans, says he's found them all to be "very reliable, well presented and good quality tradesmen".

Ms Raffen, who organised Mr Kang's visa, agrees.

"We would probably take (another) 10 of them tomorrow if we could get 10 that were just like Mo," she said.