Compared to five years ago, the number of employed people in Vietnam has increased by 26%. Workers have stable jobs with wages increasing year on year. The life of labourers has improved, working conditions and labour hygiene and safety have been ensured, while basic international labour standards have been widely applied at businesses.
However, in the context of COVID-19 having seriously affected production and business, many groups of labourers, especially workers in simple jobs, are still working in low quality environments and struggling with great difficulties.
In fact, the recent outbreak of the COVID-19 epidemic has “attacked” industrial parks and export processing zones in some localities such as Bac Giang, Bac Ninh, and recently, Ho Chi Minh City, with many new cases reported in a short time, stalling production and business activities.
In these industrial zones, there are very important production facilities, belonging to the production fields with high levels of export revenue, with a very large number of workers coming from almost all provinces and cities in the country. If not strictly managed, the risk of disease transmission here is very large. Therefore, ensuring the dual goals of both epidemic prevention and control while restoring stable production and business in industrial zones, and ensuring the safety of workers is an urgent requirement.
In recent times, the Government, ministries, branches and localities have taken many drastic solutions to prevent and control the epidemic in general, ensuring safety in areas with a large concentration of workers in particular, attaching particular importance to solutions aimed atensuring the stability of workers' lives.
Many meetings of the Government Standing Committee and the National Steering Committee for COVID-19 Prevention and Control recently focused on solutions in order to continue to effectively implement the orientations, guidelines, policies, tasks and solutions of the Party and State.
The Prime Minister recently issued a directive asking the relevant ministries and localities to ensure stable jobs, improve the quality and working conditions of labourers, especially factory workers nationwide.
The Government leader asked the State Bank of Vietnam and Social Policy Bank to continue supporting programmes and offering policies which allow employers to borrow loans to pay wages. At the same time the Vietnam General Confederation of Labour must pay attention to employees’ material and spiritual lives.
The PM ordered the relevant ministries and localities to focus on investment in social infrastructure to meet the living, study and entertainment demands of labourers, take hygiene measures at workplaces and propose micro-policies to support workers. They must find solutions to lift difficulties related to the housing of factory workers and develop the model of industrial parks-urban area-services to meet the demands of factory workers and experts.
The PM assigned the Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs, to finalise draft policies to support labourers and businesses during the pandemic, sticking to the dual targets of maintaining business and productionwhile combating the pandemic. Ministries and localities must continue to finalise legal policies on employment, wages, social insurance, occupational safety and health on the basis of summarising and evaluating the practice of the full implementation of legislation.
