Its chief communications and corporate affairs officer, Roshaimi Mat Rosely said there are 693,969 active contributors registered under Socso’s social security scheme for the self-employed nationwide as of Sept 27, Bernama reported.

“The number of self-employed contributors is expected to increase further given that the scheme’s contributions for hawkers and licensed traders will start on Jan 1 next year,” he told reporters at a meeting in Seremban today.

On July 1, human resources minister Steven Sim was reported to have said that there were 650,000 contributors as of June. This shows that the number of contributors had increased by over 43,000 in the past three months alone.

At the time, Sim was also quoted as saying that the government was considering scrapping the current manual registration process and imposing an automatic registration for gig workers when they register with companies such as Grab or Foodpanda.

Meanwhile, Roshaimi said engagement sessions with all parties, especially local authorities across the country throughout the year, will be held to raise awareness for those who are self-employed including traders and hawkers.

He stressed that various initiatives could be taken advantage of by those who are self-employed, through this comprehensive long-term social security protection.

The scheme, which was established under the Self-Employment Social Security Act 2017, offers medical, temporary and permanent disablement, and dependents’ benefits. The government covers 90% of the contribution costs, with the remaining 10% funded by the companies.