Beijing Youth Daily:

According to the government work report, the task of stabilizing employment is more formidable this year. At the same time, China targets a surveyed urban unemployment rate of no more than 5.5% for 2022, which is even lower than the rate of around 5.5% last year. How was this target set? What are our considerations? Will it be completed this year? In addition, I noticed that it is said that there are 200 million workers in flexible employment in China. What's your take on that? Thanks.

Xiang Dong:

Employment is a significant issue concerning people's livelihood, especially for a large country like us with a population of more than 1.4 billion. Last year, stabilizing employment was much affected as enterprise, especially micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), ran into difficulties due to multiple problems such as high commodity prices, the COVID-19 pandemic and other natural disasters. Nevertheless, we kept macro policy targeted, and strengthened efforts to keep the operations of market entities stable, maintain stable employment, and ensure people's wellbeing. Departments at local levels also took measures actively to support people to start business or secure employment through multiple channels. With the joint efforts, 12.69 million urban jobs were added, and the average surveyed unemployment rate stood at 5.1%. We accomplished the target for the year, which was a hard-won achievement. 

This year, the task of stabilizing employment is more formidable. There will be nearly 16 million new entrants into the workforce, including a record high of 10.76 million college graduates. On the other hand, MSMEs and self-employed individuals, which are the sources of employment for several hundred million people, still face multiple difficulties. The government work report set the target of maintaining a surveyed urban unemployment rate of no more than 5.5%, lower than the target of around 5.5% last year. This is because employment is key to people's wellbeing and social stability, and following the recovery and development of the economy, we must further prioritize employment-first efforts and ensure all parties fulfill their duties. Therefore, the government work report said that the employment-first policy should be pursued with intensified efforts to deliver the desired outcomes. And we will take complete consideration of the need to stabilize employment when formulating policies concerning tax and fee reductions, support of industries facing particular difficulties, and key groups, among others. With the intensified measures and policies, we are confident of achieving the target for the year. Of course, the target is for the whole year, and that of some individual months may be relatively high. We will step up our efforts to keep the unemployment rate as low as possible.

You mentioned flexible employment. Flexible employment is an important way to boost employment. As the mindset of workers on career choice has changed and enterprises have varied their ways of hiring people, especially with the rapid development of new industries and new forms of business, there is an increasing number of workers in flexible employment, which is now about 200 million. Flexible employment creates jobs for people, especially those in difficulty. At the same time, it demands more from the employment service and social security. Flexible employment is particularly important in ensuring the well-being of people during the COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, we will improve our support measures for flexible employment and optimize its labor and social security policies to promote its healthy development, and encourage companies to create more jobs with stable income and sufficient guarantees and in different types as they recover and develop.