As a rule, factories lose thousands of manual workers after Tet holiday but rehires new staff by end in the early second quarter. However, the rule seems to be broken this year.

As a rule, the factories lose thousands of manual workers after the traditional New Year holiday but rehires new staff by end in the early second quarter. However, the rule seems to be broken this year. Many companies say they can’t recruit enough workers and laborers refuse to work due to the low salary.

South hit by worker shortage

Worker shortage to pounce with Year of the Tiger

Several workers read job advertisements at the gate of an industrial zone in Hanoi.

In Hanoi, many foreign-invested companies like Yamaha, Cannon, Panasonic, Denso, Toho, Sumitomo, Hoya and many joint venture and joint stock companies have released urgent recruitment advertisements. But a Tien Phong reporter saw only a few workers at the information board by the gate of Hanoi’s Nam Thang Long industrial zone.

Nguyen Thi Ha from Hai Duong province said she dropped in to see inquire about the salary but was disappointed. Ha said it is better to return home to do farm work because she it is not worth hassle associated with accommodations, travel and cooking.

Some employers have raised salary by several hundreds of thousands dong a month to attract workers but the average pay is still only 1.5 to 2 million dong a month ($80-100). They say they currently need workers aged 18-30, with high-school certificate.

Though some companies now supply tenement houses and traveling stipends, they still find they can only recruit a dozen new workers though they need anywhere from 300-1000.

The Japanese-invested Sumitomo company, which manufactures phones and computers, announced its desire to recruit 150 female workers but after one hour, just over 20 people dropped in to get information. This time last year there would have been hundreds of applicants.

The situation is similar in southern provinces. Dong Nai, generally a big labour market, now needs more than 50,000 manual workers. Meanwhile, many workers quit job in industrial zones to search for new work or start their own businesses, said Pham Minh Thanh, deputy director of Dong Nai Province Social Insurance Agency.

Last year over 100,000 workers in Dong Nai quit their jobs but employers could only recruit around 90,000 to replace them, Thanh said.

Nguyen Thanh Thuan, from the central province of Ha Tinh, said that he and his wife worked for a factory in the Bien Hoa 2 Industrial Zone in Dong Nai. After the Tet holiday, he decided to quit job to open his own hairdresser’s shop. Though his wife still works in the industrial zone.

He said he and his wife were able to live with their salary but since they have a child, their combined monthly income of 4 million is not enough. Now that he works as a hairdresser, Thuan can earn around 100,000 dong a day; which is double his previous salary.

Nguyen Han, from the central province of Quang Ngai, said he quit his job at a company in Dong Nai to work as a builder, earning 160,000 dong a day, plus three meals, much higher than his previous salary.

Dao Thi Van Anh, an official in charge of labour in Long Bien district, Hanoi, where hosts some industrial zones, said that after crisis, companies need more workers to resume production but the pay they offer is too low.

PV