The reopening of the Border with Singapore has left eateries in Johor Bahru facing a struggle to employ and retain cooks while managing the increase in clients. President John Ang of the Johor Bahru Cooks Association stated that intense competition exists among coffee shops and eatery owners for cooks, with many offering higher salaries to attract workers. The problem of the lack of cooks has been going on in Johor Bahru for several years owing to their proximity to Singapore, but he told The Star that the problem seems to have become more serious since the border reopening that took place last year.
Several of the cooks returned to Singapore where they earned at least three times the pay compared with working in Johor Bahru. This came with the book in the food business since dining restrictions were lifted.
Several eatery owners have been offering higher wages and the salary of a cook in Johor Bahru has increased in general by approximately 30% when compared with pre-pandemic times. Mr. Ang said that the competition among eateries to retain cooks coupled with an increase in the prices of goods has led to the prices of food at coffee shops and restaurants being more expensive in such eateries. Meanwhile, Johor Bahru Business & Hawker Association president Roland Lim said that the majority of their foreign workers including those trained for years in the service line have returned to their home countries because of the pandemic, and as such, businesses with foreign employees face difficulties in training their cooks. As a result, they are getting new and inexperienced workers, who need to be trained again. Some eateries were compelled to remove certain dishes from their menus as their cooks could not make them. Some of the foreign workers in the food & beverage industry were meant to be in the construction sector and had no skills in cooking. Hence they have to be taught how to cook local food. Owing to the lack of cooks, certain restaurants are ‘stealing’ workers from other sectors, due to desperation. Many of the foreign workers feel that since the demand for cooks is high, they are willing to take up offers from other eateries. According to the President of the Pan Malaysia Koo Soo Restaurants & Chefs Association, Wong Teu Hoon, another contributing factor is that during the pandemic, several cooks lost their jobs since restaurants could not retain them, and a many of these former cooks have now opened up their own businesses or ventured into other fields to earn a living. Now that business is back on track, several restaurants find it difficult to get back the workers they retrenched.
Mr. Wong, President of the Malaysia Singapore Coffee Shop Proprietors’ General Association stated that the shortage of cooks is not a problem that is taking place only in Johor, but all over Malaysia, although it is more serious in Johor.
According to restaurant owner Lennox Cheok, the majority of cooks who prefer to work in Singapore are in their 20s or 30s and some of them will gain experience for a few months or a year in Johor prior to looking for a cooking job in Singapore. He said that there are also groups on messaging apps that are dedicated to promoting job openings in the Singapore food & beverage industry. In his case, he has retained all his cooks during the pandemic and hence has sufficient employees. His local cooks have worked with him for more than 10 years and are not so keen to find other job opportunities. A customer from KL who went to Johor Bahru last week to visit his relatives said he was surprised to see that some of his favourite dishes had been removed from the restaurant he frequently visited. He was disappointed to hear that the cook had left to join a restaurant in Singapore.
