|
DAILY NEWS ONLINE |
|
|
|
OTHER EDITIONS |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
|
OTHER LINKS |
 |
 |
 |
 |
China offers more jobs to migrant millions
The country's migrant millions remain in the spotlight this year as the Chinese government launched a "Spring Breeze Action" to help them find jobs, by simplifying procedures and reducing costs. The program, launched by the Ministry of Labor and Social Security, has for the first time offered jobs to the migrant population without charging any service fees. About 113 million out of China's 900 million peasant farmers have taken on jobs at construction sites, production lines or in the service sector - often jobs that are too strenuous, dirty or underpaid for city dwellers. This special group of people, excluded for long from the urban job market and social security schemes, drew unprecedented attention in 2004, in the wake of a nationwide drive to tackle their wage arrears - in which Premier Wen Jiabao himself played an exemplary leading role. China's capital Beijing has vowed to offer at least 100,000 jobs to rural laborers and banned old regulations that discouraged local employers from recruiting migrant workers to fill up certain vacancies. In the fortnight following the Spring Festival in February, the biggest family union festival for the Chinese, the southern boom city Shenzhen has held 17 recruitment fairs for the migrant job- hunters to meet potential employers. Also in February, east China's Zhejiang Province lifted a 10- year-old licensing system that requested the migrant population to apply for an official permit before going to the urban job market. "These are all signs that the migrant workers have come to enjoy the same treatment as the urban residents," said Wen Jiating, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, the country's top political advisory body that is to open its annual meeting here. |
|
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |