Shanghai plans to reduce its urban registered unemployment rate to under 4.5 percent this year, and create 500,000 new job opportunities for its nearly 20 million population, officials from the Municipal Labor and Social Security Bureau, said.

Shanghai's unemployment rate stood at 4.4 percent at the end of last year, according to the bureau.

Jiang Zhuoqing, director of the bureau, said at a working conference yesterday, the city had created 663,000 new jobs in the past year, 137,000 of which were "non-farm" jobs offered to the rural labor force.

He said a major challenge the city faces is finding enough jobs for the expanding labor force.

"Groups have to take effective measures to help young college and technical school graduates, and the surplus labor force generated by industry adjustment and land requisition.

"We also encourage people to become employed in flexible ways and also create their own businesses," he said.

The municipal government plans to provide 30,000 young people with internship programs this year in the city's leading sectors, including the high-tech, and service industries.

Shen Xiaoming, director of the Shanghai Education Commission, said yesterday that a 10 million yuan (US$1.25 million) fund, jointly sponsored by the commission and the city's Science and Technology Commission, will be annually offered, starting this year, to graduates who start their own businesses.

According to Jiang, the basic social security coverage will keep expanding in Shanghai, toward a goal of 98 percent, as referred to in the city's 11th Five-Year Plan (2006-10).

"We will further strengthen the implementation of basic social security systems in both the town and counties. We also plan to optimize some policies concerning security, pension and medial insurance to benefit more low-income residents," Jiang said.

In the past year, the local government has increased the amount of retirement pension and upgraded minimum wages.

Shanghai established an insurance system in 2002 for the migrant population who are employed in the city. The system consists of compensation, medical insurance, and pension. Jiang said such a system is expected to cover more than 3 million migrant workers this year.

(China Daily March 9, 2007)