Hanoi (VNA) 🌳– Vietnam sent over 56,800 workers, including 21,238 females, abroad to work under labour contracts over the first seven months of 2022, equivalent to 63.2 percent of the target set for the year.

According to data from the Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs (MoLISA), Japan, Taiwan (China) and the Republic of Korea (RoK) remained the largest recipients of Vietnamese labourers during the reviewed period. With the number of workers going to work abroad continuing to remain stable, Vietnam’s plan to send 90,000 labourers to work abroad this year is completely feasible, the ministry said. Due to the impact of COVID-19, last year, Vietnam completed only 50 percent of its yearly target in labour export with 45,058 workers sent abroad. Thanks to wide-scale vaccination against COVID-19 and the changes in pandemic control strategies towards adapting to the pandemic, many countries have opened their doors for foreign workers, including those from Vietnam. Specifically, Taiwan resumed the reception of foreign labourers from February, while the Republic of Korea (RoK) announced that it needs 59,000 foreign workers in 2022, and Japan has loosened entry regulations to raise the number of arrivals from 3,500 to 5,000 daily from March. In Europe, nine countries – Poland, Lithuania, Hungary, Bulgaria, Cyprus Republic, Turkey, Slovakia, Belarus and Portugal - have accepted workers from Vietnam. Many labour suppliers are recruiting up to thousands of labourers for jobs overseas. However, labourers are still reluctant to go overseas due to concern over the pandemic, resulting in limited supply. The Department of Overseas Labour under the MoLISA said that the target of labour export for this year is reachable. This year, it will focus on reaching new labour cooperation contracts for markets where workers are paid with high and stable wages, while conducting training for workers and preparing necessary conditions for them to meet the requirements of the host markets. Besides traditional markets such as Japan, the RoK and Taiwan, the MoLISA has strived to make inroads into promising markets like Germany, Russia, Australia and Israel. Currently, Germany is in need of about 40,000 health workers as well as a large number of workers for the automobile and hospitality sectors. Meanwhile, the RoK, one of the markets receiving a large number of Vietnamese workers, has just announced that it will receive 59,000 Vietnamese guest workers in 2022 under the EPS programme, up 7,000 compared to 2021. This is extremely positive information in the context that the number of Vietnamese workers going to the RoK decreased sharply in 2021. Not only the RoK, Vietnamese workers also have more opportunities to work in Singapore when the Southeast Asian country implements a pilot programme to receive Vietnamese labourers to work in the construction, marine and processing industries. During the January-July period, the ministry completed negotiations with Israel's functional agencies over a labour cooperation agreement, signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) under the Australian Agriculture Visa Programme and reached an agreement on labour recruitment between Vietnam and Thailand. The ministry also finalised an MoU on skilled labour migration and knowledge exchange with Germany; and renewed an MOU on recruitment, employment and repatriation of workers between the governments of Vietnam and Malaysia. It has directed businesses to carry out activities to maintain and expand markets and keep a close watch on the COVID-19 situation. They need to keep up-to-date on new policies and regulations on labour recruitment in response to the COVID-19 development in other countries. It has also guided businesses to organise sending labourers to work abroad to ensure they are in line with regulations on COVID-19 prevention and control in the host countries. The Government issued Resolution No. 83/NQ-CP dated July 8, 2022 on making deposits and providing loan support to make deposits for migrant labourers working in the RoK under the RoK's Employment Permit System./.