Refugees find a place at Perdue

This plant has a shortage of workers and has found many new employees in the refugees that live in the area. DP

by Olivia Webb

Since 1962, thousands of Burmese people have escaped government-sponsored social, political and religious persecution - including torture and forced labor - by coming to America.

To date, 53 of them have been hired to work at Perdue in Rockingham.

Community leaders got to learn about the culture of the new employees at an informal luncheon at the plant Thursday afternoon.

According to Jim Brown, complex human resources manager at Perdue, the new Burmese hires fill a void because they are very eager to work, and they meet all of the necessary human resource requirements.

“Any applicant that comes in here and passes our criteria, we’re going to hire them. We don’t discriminate. But our existing pool of applicants didn’t fulfill our needs.”

“We have a 40 percent turnover rate per year, and it is very costly. If you have 1,300 employees, and 40 percent of them leave every year, that’s over 500 new people that you have to train.”

Which is why Perdue called to see what they had to offer at the Raleigh office of the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (USCRI), a non-profit that provides services and addresses the needs and rights of persons in forced or voluntary migration worldwide.
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