[originaltext] Laid-off workers are still the focus of China’s unemployment

Laid-off workers are still the focus of China’s unemployment problem.
    Wang Yadong, a senior official at the Ministry of Labor and Social Security said the year will conclude the government’s three-year policy of actively promoting employment. The plan was adopted in 2002 to provide subsidies and job opportunities for laid-off workers. He said that a system of unemployment insurance will take its place.
    By the end of last year, there were 1.53 million laid-off workers from state-owned companies nationwide, with 930,000 currently registered in re-employment service centers.
    Ministry spokesman Hu Xiaoyi said officials will expand the unemployment insurance system this year to employees of non-state-owned enterprises. So far, a dozen provinces - mostly in the east and the north - have established such systems, while western areas will catch up gradually.
    Meanwhile, the number of jobless young people is on the rise. Statistics show young people make up an increasing part of the unemployed, 0.7 percent more than that from the same period over last year.
    Analysts say the upward expansion in college enrolment in recent years is much to blame since it has ignored unbalanced industrial development and has failed to match market demands.
    The undesirable employment situation can also be found in some poor areas, several industries and some special groups, including the disabled.
    The ministry said it will produce a new package of measures to solve employment problems among laid-off workers, college students and the rural labor force during the next year.