Export of workers eases growing unemployment
Labour authorities plan to 'export' more workers to relieve growing unemployment.
'A huge number of workers, suspended by state-run enterprises under reforms in recent years, are finding new jobs overseas,' said an official of the China Foreign Labour Service Company.
There were 120 million rural labourers and more than three million town inhabitants seeking jobs, he said.
Each year a further 20 million people entered the job market, creating favourable conditions for the export of labourers, he said.
'Accelerating the export of workers is essential,' he said.
In comparison with major labour-export countries like India and the Philippines, the official said China labourers only constituted one per cent in the international labour market.
In the first 10 months of last year, 280,000 workers went abroad. The figure for 1995 was 260,000.
Industries in which China's emigrant labourers work have broadened from civil engineering and textile manufacturing to software development, aircraft maintenance, and engineering consultancy and management.
The area for exporting labourers also expanded from the Middle East to 180 countries and cities around the world.
From the late 1970s until 1995, workers sent abroad added up to 1.1 million and the money for contracts involved amounted to US$10.77 billion (about HK$83.27 billion).
