Chongqing battles rising unemployment as China’s traditional industrial base follows nationwide slump
- The economy in the landlocked city grew just 6 per cent in 2018, its slowest pace since 1989, falling behind its own 8.5 per cent target
- Local government struggling to find jobs for residents and returning migrant workers who were laid off as the US-China trade war forced factories to downsize
With the Chinese economy slowing, concern has increased among Chinese policymakers about the outlook for employment, since ensuring sufficient employment is seen as a necessary ingredient in maintaining social stability in the country. Employment was the top priority the Politburo set last July when it shifted its economic policy focus to stabilising growth, leading the government to enact a series of policies to counter rising joblessness. This series will explore the employment challenges faced by different segments of the Chinese economy. This final instalment looks at the situation in China’s traditional industrial base of Chongqing.
The lights are out on a chilly Friday morning in January at the Zhicheng Job Centre, a once-bustling spot in the southwest of the city of Chongqing where recruiters used to come to find future employees. But on this occasion a four-hour job fair for marketing and services industries has been scrapped at the eleventh hour.
“No company has registered for this fair,” said a member of staff. “We have no choice but to cancel it.”
It is a far cry from the picture the job centre paints on its promotional brochure, with four job fairs planned every week across its 32,000 sq ft premises and 500 booths, potentially helping more than 200 companies connect with around 2,000 jobseekers.
The local government has attempted to offset the cancellation of these large-scale job fairs across the city by organising smaller neighbourhood events, seeking to reassure the population even after growth in industrial output nosedived last year.
Until last year, economic expansion in hilly and landlocked Chongqing, China’s traditional industrial base, had surpassed the national pace in the last decade, and it was one of the fastest growing regions nationwide until the country’s overall slowdown.
