With 13 million urban Chinese expected to be unemployed each year, those most at risk of joblessness are asking why so many fall through the country's unemployment safety net.

Whilst 24 million urban residents will be looking for jobs annually in the future, there are likely to be only 11 million available openings, said Minister of Labor and Social Security Tian Chengping in an interview with the Party-owned Study Times.

College graduates, rural migrant workers, the self-employed and private sector employees are all facing a future with no job and no support.

Workers paying into the country's unemployment insurance system for more than a year can receive hundreds of yuan in subsidies if made redundant, but jobless graduates do not benefit form this

"Professional training is what graduates need most," says Zhang Youshan, director of the unemployment insurance office with the Labor and Social Security Department of Shandong Province, calling for training to be funded by the unemployment insurance fund.

This year, 4.13 million students graduated from institutions of higher learning, but one in three will remain jobless a year from now, according to the Ministry of Labor and Social Security.

Migrant rural laborers also need better protection. Employers of migrant workers are legally responsible for paying their unemployment insurance premiums.

Despite government support, only 443,000 migrant workers received unemployment allowances in 2004 out of around 120 million nationwide, says He Ping, president of the ministry's National Institute for Social Insurance.

Many migrant workers are unaware of these benefits and their employers tend to avoid payments to reduce costs, says Zhang. Experts have urged the government to tighten insurance payments monitoring and to educate migrant workers as to their rights.

The self-employed are also overlooked when they seek allowances.

"That should not be covered by unemployment subsidies, but is hard to supervise due to inadequate management," says Zhang, referring to people fraudulently obtaining benefits.

Many social security departments lack technical support for information collection and management, making new job contracts and insurance payment renewals the only means to recognize reemployment, says Zhang Bin, director of the supervision office for Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region’s Labor and Social Security Department .

Meanwhile, unregistered employees and the self-employed are difficult to manage, since no individual accounts exist as of yet for unemployment insurance.

China's unemployment insurance premiums are paid by enterprises and institutions collectively along with individual payments by their employees.

The low proportion of insured workers has been overshadowed by the robust growth of the unemployment insurance fund, which strengthened by 30 percent to 51.1 billion yuan (US$6.4 billion) last year.

Of the 760-million labor force in China at the end of last year, only about 100 million possessed unemployment insurance cover.

Private enterprises see unemployment insurance as burdening, while many workers fear annoying their bosses by raising the question, says Li Yuanzhi, deputy director of the unemployment insurance office of the Shandong Labor and Social Security Department.

Some local governments turn a blind eye to the situation as they fear iscouraging investment or reducing private economical development, says Li.

Meanwhile, employees of state-owned enterprises with steady profits are reluctant to pay, considering unemployment unlikely and the premiums merely a donation to the poor, Li says.

Experts say the payments should be adjusted to local commodity prices and minimum urban living allowances. The law requires payments to be less than the local minimum wage, but more than urban minimum living allowances.

(Xinhua News Agency December 7, 2006)