‘You cannot run away from this reality’: Jaishankar says world requires a global workforce amid Trump’s H-1B visa decision

One cannot run away from the reality that a global workforce has pervaded every country, said External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar after US President Donald Trump hiked the H-1B visa fee to $100,000 to deter a rush of applications. Jaishankar said it is important for today's changing world to have a global workforce. 

The H-1B visas that allow US companies to hire foreign professionals in specialised fields that require advanced knowledge or expertise, is largely used by Indian professionals, who make up the vast majority of the applicants.

Jaishankar was speaking at the ‘At the Heart of Development: Aid, Trade, and Technology’ hosted by the Observer Research Foundation (ORF) on the margins of the UN General Assembly session. "Where that global workforce is to be housed and located may be a matter of a political debate. But there's no getting away. If you look at demand and you look at demographics, demands cannot be met in many countries purely out of national demographics," he said.

"This is a reality. You cannot run away from this reality. So how do we create a more acceptable, contemporary, efficient model of a global workforce, which is then located in a distributed, global workplace? I think this is a very big question today which the international economy has to address,” he said.

“We will see, as part of this re-engineered world, new, more different trade arrangements between countries, countries which will make decisions which they may not have made in other circumstances, countries which today will feel the desire, sometimes even the compulsion, to have new partners and new regions,” Jaishankar said.

Trade continues to find a way despite uncertainties, said Jaishankar, adding that it is easier to trade today due to improved physical and digital infrastructure such as better roads, shipping, and smoother trade interfaces. He said obstacles and complications that may arise but was confident that these will be countered or mitigated by developments in the broader domain.

Technology, trade, connectivity, and workplaces are evolving rapidly, leading to a very different world in the near future, he said, stressing the importance for large countries to build capacities for greater self-reliance, a key focus in India. Multipolarity is not automatic but must be built by strengthening national capacities, said Jaishankar.