Azerbaijan to develop employment concept

/By AzerNews/

By Aynur Karimova

A new 10-year concept of employment is being developed at the instruction of President Ilham Aliyev.

Salim Muslimov, Minister for Labor and Social Protection of Population said that the concept covering 2016-2025 will be developed in three months by a work group with participation of the representatives of the due state bodies, Azerbaijan Confederation of Trade Unions, National Confederation of Entrepreneurs (Employers) Organizations of Azerbaijan and the nongovernmental organizations, as well as the World Bank, the UN Population Fund and the International Labor Organization.

“The draft will reflect the necessary steps for the analysis of the current macroeconomic situation and labor market, tendencies and prospects of future development, upcoming challenges and problems, main goals and tasks of policy, employment in the coming years, ensuring balance between demand and proposal on the labor market, etc,” the minister said on January 27.

The government of Azerbaijan has been taking decisive measures to decrease the level of unemployment to a minimum, and to provide better living conditions for low-income families.

Currently, the unemployment ratio is equal to 5 percent. Despite this small figure, the government continues its care for low-income families.

A presidential decree on allocation of 20 million manats ($12.5 million) for financing the targeted social assistance is expected to strengthen the social protection of such families.

As of January 26, the number of families appealing for the targeted social assistance in various regions of Azerbaijan stood at 22,000.

As of December 30, 2015, some 114,000 families or approximately 500,000 people were reported to receive the targeted social assistance. The government provides assistance to each family in the amount of 153 manats ($95.6).

Muslimov also pointed out that due to the positive demographic trends, the population of Azerbaijan continues to grow.

“This trend, in turn, determines the future creation of new jobs as our main problem. Therefore, assessment of the impact of demographic factors on the labor market will be taken into account during the preparation of the Concept,” the Minister said.

Meanwhile, the government seeks to open new jobs throughout the country. It is planned to create up to 300 jobs in each region of Azerbaijan. This can be achieved by attracting people to labor work based on six-month contracts, Muslimov said earlier.

In this regard, the ministry has been collecting information about the available number of employees, employment and number of the unemployed in different regions of the country.

"Currently, this process is nearing completion,” he told journalists on January 26. “One of the main issues on the agenda is to attract employees to the economic life in the different regions of the country.”

The government is able to deal with creating new jobs, according to him.