Dubai: Indian and Pakistani workers in the Gulf nations are the most dissatisfied with their current employment among all expatriates, initial results of a new survey have showed.

According to a salary survey being conducted by the Arabian Business website, 69 percent of Indian and Pakistani workers said they were most dissatisfied with their current employment and likely to quit their jobs this year.

Only 16 percent of Indian and 13 percent of Pakistani workers said they were less likely to switch jobs, the website said in a report Sunday. Around 7,000 workers have responded to the survey till now.

"Gulf businesses face a tough year ahead trying to retain staff, with more than two-thirds of employees indicating they are more likely to leave their job this year than in 2007," the report stated.

It said data collected so far shows a sharp decline in job loyalty across the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, led by Oman, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

While Indian and Pakistanis were at the top of the job dissatisfaction table in most GCC countries, in the UAE, South Africans, at 71 percent, were more likely to change companies in the coming year.There are around five million expatriate Indians across the six Gulf nations.

In Saudi Arabia, expatriates from Britain were the most likely to seek a new job in 2008 with more than one in 10 indicating an increased likelihood of finding new employment, the report said.

At the other end, Bahrain registered the highest level of company loyalty, but over half of employees still said they planned a job switch this year, compared to just 20 percent that said they were more likely to stay put.

With the currencies of most of the GCC countries being pegged to the tumbling US dollar, the attractiveness of the region for expatriate workers has gone down in the last couple of years.

"Inflation surged to record highs across the Gulf last year, hitting 14 percent in Qatar, 7.6 percent in Oman, 6.2 percent in Kuwait, six percent in Saudi Arabia and 4.9 percent in Bahrain," according to the report. In the UAE, inflation hit a record 19-year high of 9.3 percent in 2006. According to analysts, it may soar up to 12 percent this year. The full results of the survey are expected next week.

Source : IANS