Beijing Labor and Social Security Bureau, together with six other departments, launched an employment assistance campaign on January 11, and an "Employment Assistance Week" will kick off on January 16. Graduates who have not found jobs, and people who have lost their jobs through downsizing or closure of businesses will benefit, the Beijing Evening News reported today.

In the current financial crisis, people who have lost jobs through downsizing or closure of businesses are, for the first time, targeted as the priority for assistance. The municipal government will provide guidance and training for their career development and help them improve their competitiveness in job hunting. For those graduates whose families have no fixed source of income, the government will take special measures such as recommendation and mandatory placement to ensure that they can take up an occupation as soon as possible.

In the Beijing area, about 212,000 college students will graduate this year, 7,000 more than last year. Among these graduates, nearly 90,000 are Beijing natives, 4,000 more than last year. Influenced by the financial crisis, the employment situation has been difficult, but there are still some sectors where large numbers of graduates are needed, such as education, medicine, cultural innovation, modern manufacturing, etc. The municipal government has set its graduates' employment target rate above 95 percent for 2009.

To maintain a timely overview of the employment situation, enterprises are required to report any staff reduction plans to the municipal labor and social security authorities. Businesses with less than 500 employees should report to the authorities if they plan to dismiss more than 20 people; ones with more than 500 employees should notify the authorities if more than 10 percent of the workforce is to be made redundant.

To date, about 60 enterprises have reported their lay-off plans to local labor authorities, most of them being small and medium-sized ones severely hit by the financial crisis. The authorities will implement dynamic monitoring over these enterprises' redundancy plans, and offer timely practical support for the unemployed.

An official from Beijing Labor and Social Security Bureau said that the registered urban unemployment rate in Beijing was 1.82 percent at the end of 2008, and the task for this year is to keep it below 2.5 percent. That is to say, there should not be more than 115,000 unemployed in Beijing in 2009.

(China.org.cn by Fan Junmei January 14, 2009)