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Wanted: Jobs for millions this year
By Cao Desheng (China Daily)
Updated: 2004-07-23 01:01
Unemployment is still a serious concern in the second half of the year
despite some improvements, senior government officials say.
More than 2 million people will lose their jobs before the end of this year
due to bankruptcies or reorganization of enterprises, said Wang Yadong Thursday.
Wang is vice-director of the Department of Training and Employment of the
Ministry of Labour and Social Security.
"Meanwhile, laid-off workers in some industries and resource-exhausted areas
will find it more difficult to get re-employed," Wang said.
The registered unemployment rate in China's urban areas in the first part of
this year was 4.3 per cent, the same as the figure recorded at the end of last
year, according to statistics released by the labour and security ministry.
The number has been on the rise from 3.1 per cent in 2000. It was 3.6 per
cent in 2001 and 4.0 per cent in 2002.
But experts say the real unemployment rate in China might reach more than 10
per cent since the statistics fail to consider surplus labour forces in rural
areas.
Job pressure is caused by a growing labour force, surplus rural labourers
flowing into urban areas and laid-off employees in cities and towns, said Chen
Mingxing, an economist with State Information Centre.
On the other hand, economic growth is creating fewer jobs, Chen said.
Thanks to the continuous government efforts some headway has been made to
tackle re-employment, said Hu Xiaoyi, a ministry spokesman during a press
conference Thursday.
In the first half this year, a total of 5.9 million urban people found
new jobs and 2.84 million laid-off urban workers were re-employed, Hu said.
Although the delay of some industrial projects in the first part of this year
had a negative impact on creating job opportunities, a series of measures
adopted by the Chinese Government have helped many people find jobs, he said.
Since 2002, the Chinese Government has started pushing for small and
guaranteed loans for laid-off workers to help them set up their own businesses.
"Government departments, including the Ministry of Labour and Social
Security, People's Bank of China and Ministry of Finance, have boosted their
support for the nation's laid-off workers by making bank loans more readily
available to them," Hu said.
Moreover, re-employment training has also helped laid-off workers get new
jobs, he said.
The ministry will continue to step up efforts by strengthening the
preferential policy of small and guaranteed bank loans to unemployed people,
said Wang.
Technical training will be intensified to help laid-off workers improve their
re-employment abilities, he added.
Unemployment control will be implemented and labour-intensive industries and
service industries will be developed so that the total employment scale can be
guaranteed, said Wang.
"By means of macro-regulation, government departments should take job
opportunities into account when examining and approving some industrial projects
to create a cycle of sound economic development and employment expanding," Wang
said.
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