Hanoi (VNS/VNA) - The COVID-19pandemic has hit Vietnam from the end of January, directly impacting thedomestic labour market, according to the General Statistics Office (GSO)'sreport on labour and jobs in the first quarter of this year. 

Unemployment also reached the highest rateover the last five years, said Vu Thi Thu Thuy, head of the GSO’s Department ofPopulation and Labour Statistics.

In the first quarter, the number ofunemployed people out of the working-age population was nearly 1.1 million, upby 26,000 people from the previous quarter and up 26,800 people year on year.

At the same time, the income growth rate oflabour year on year was nearly a half of the growth rate in the first quarterof last year compared to the first quarter of 2018.

In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic,labourers without work contracts and unofficial employment are the mostvulnerable, Thuy said.

According to the GSO survey on impacts ofCOVID-19 to businesses and employment in the first four months, there werenearly five million workers suffering negative impacts from the pandemic.

Of which, the manufacturing and processingindustry was the most affected with 1.2 million workers; following by thewholesale and retail industry with more than 1.1 million workers and theaccommodation and catering industry with nearly 740,000 workers.

As of mid-April 2020, the transport,warehousing and education sectors had the highest number of temporarilylaid-off workers, accounting for 70 percent of the total workers in eachsector.

Meanwhile, the manufacturing and processingindustry and the catering service industry had the highest proportion ofpermanently unemployed and laid-off workers accounting for nearly 20 percent ofthe total workers in each sector.

According to the office, large andmedium-sized enterprises were more vulnerable than small and micro enterpriseswith more than 90 percent of large and medium-sized enterprises havingdifficulties in the first four months of this year.

Challenges remains

“Until the end of the second quarter, thepandemic will remain a significant challenge for enterprises and workers.Therefore, to overcome present difficulties, the Government, businesses andworkers need to work together to control the pandemic and to graduallystabilise and develop the domestic economy,” GSO Deputy General Director PhamQuang Vinh said.

The Government has put forward many policiesto prevent and control the pandemic as well as support enterprises andemployees to overcome those difficulties and ensure social security.

However, to increase efficiency of thesepolicies, ministries, sectors and localities need coordination inadministrative reform to ensure that all eligible enterprises and workers couldenjoy the Government’s support packages due to difficulties during thepandemic.

Besides that, those businesses and workersneed to be aware that those policies are only supportive, so they need toactively find business and employment opportunities during and after thepandemic.

Thuy has recommended that the enterprisesshould renew production and business processes as well as find new importmarkets of input materials and expand export markets.

They should also have training courses toimprove skills of workers and promote application of information technology toconvert from traditional to online transactions.

For workers, they need to improve theirprofessional skills and prepare soft skills to adapt to non-stop changes of thelabour market, Thuy said./.