The global slowdown triggered by the US subprime mortgage debacle has definitely made it more difficult for China to keep unemployment down.
However, the strong employment figures that the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security released yesterday indicate that, with enhanced government support, the country can still manage to maintain a stable employment rate.
Latest statistics show that China has created 9.36 million new jobs in the first three quarters and helped another 4.09 million laid-off workers to be re-employed.
With a population of 1.3 billion, the world's largest, China faces such a heavy employment pressure that 10 million people will enter the workforce every year between now and 2010.
Worse, as the country's economic growth has fallen to the lowest level in five years so far this year due to shrinking overseas demand, unemployment has emerged as a growing concern. Media reports already had that scores of factories are closing in the country's export region.
Under such circumstances, the creation of more than 9 million jobs in the first three quarters surely came as a better-than-expected result.
On the one hand, it offered a cause for optimism.
By meeting as much as 94 percent of the annual target of creating 10 million jobs, the country has marched far ahead of its employment schedule in spite of unfavorable economic conditions.
If the country can continue to create jobs at a similar pace, it is more than likely that the public as a whole will be better buffered against the economic slowdown at home and abroad.
On the other hand, the robust growth in the number of jobs created also highlighted the importance of support that the government has given to labor-intensive enterprises, small and medium-sized businesses, private firms and the service sector.
The combination of active employment policies and fast economic growth has increased the number of the newly employed in Chinese cities from 8.4 million in 2002 to 12.04 million people last year.
Yet, after five years of double-digit expansion, the Chinese economy is going to slow down. Therefore, policymakers can no longer count on robust economic growth to boost employment.
Instead, they can come up with more preferential policies to facilitate creation of jobs.
China has stepped up its policy support to promote employment like increased credits and loans for small and medium-sized enterprises and taxation, financing and other incentives for start-up businesses. The government also has to provide more career training for laid-off workers, helping them to be re-employed as soon as possible.
To weather the economic slowdown ahead, pro-employment measures will be needed more than ever before.
(China Daily 10/28/2008 page8)
