South China's Guangdong
Province is planning to allow its farmers, who fail to find
employment in urban areas, to enjoy the same social welfare that is
offered to their urban counterparts.
According to the Guangdong Provincial Bureau of Labour and Social
Security officials, new regulations to ensure farmers to have equal
employment rights and opportunities are now being drafted.
Meanwhile, the province is also considering introducing a unified
unemployment insurance system to both urban residents and farmers
for the upcoming years, the official said Monday.
"The move aims to safeguard the employment rights and legal
interests of the province's large number of farmers who are now
losing their farmland because of rapid industrial and service
sector development," said an official who declined to be
named.
Currently, farmers are not entitled to be registered as permanent
urban residents in accordance with laws and regulations in cities.
That means they do not enjoy the same status as local residents in
training, education and medical insurance programs.
And farmers now have no unemployment relief payments, like urban
residents, if they cannot find employment.
Prosperous cities such as Guangzhou, the provincial capital,
Shenzhen, Zhuhai, Dongguan and Foshan in the Pearl River Delta,
will become the pilot cities to introduce the new systems in the
coming years, the official said.
Bu he declined to estimate future unemployment rates, or how many
persons will not be employed, in Guangdong when farmers are
included in the urban laid-off worker totals.
Guangdong, which has a registered population of more than 80
million who enjoy residency permits in the province, has 23 million
migrant workers.
Of the province's large number of migrant workers, about 17 million
come from outside the province while 6 million others are mainly
farmers from the province's rural areas.
Guangdong's urban unemployment rate is expected to be controlled at
under 4 percent this year, indicating about 300,000 urban residents
will not be employed.
And Peng Guoxin, a professor from the Guangdong Academy of Social
Sciences, said the new system will further protect farmers'
interests and will be positive in ensuring Guangdong's social
stability.
And the new system will also help narrow the gap between urban
residents and farmers, Peng said.
Peng predicted that more and more farmers will leave their land to
find jobs in cities in the years ahead, accelerating the province's
urbanization drive, particularly in the prosperous Pearl River
Delta region.
In view of this, Guangdong will establish a five-tier system to
strengthen the management of the growing numbers of farmers who
rush to cities to find jobs.
In addition to a special leading group for managing the floating
population and farmers at the provincial level, all neighborhoods,
townships, counties and cities in the province will be required to
set up special offices, departments and organizations to handle the
issue.
(China Daily September 28, 2004)