Effective Management of Labor in IPs

In recent times, the acceleration of investment attraction in Vinh Phuc's industrial parks (IPs) has brought many job opportunities for workers; however, it has posed great challenges in labor management for the local authorities. The Vietnam Business Forum had an interview with Mr. Vu Kim Thanh, Deputy Director of the Vinh Phuc Industrial Parks Authority about this issue. Nguyet Tham reports.

Recently, Vinh Phuc IPs have attracted many investment projects, leading to an increase in the number of workers in the IPs. Therefore, the labor management in IPs will have many challenges, especially in the context of complicated developments of the COVID-19 pandemic. So what are those difficulties and challenges?

Currently, Vinh Phuc IPs are creating jobs for over 100,000 workers. With the rapid development of IPs in the province, the demand for labor in IPs will increase. Therefore, the State management of labor in IPs also faces many difficulties in ensuring a harmonious, stable and developing relationship between enterprises and employees. Moreover, the number of foreign workers working in Vinh Phuc province is relatively large (about 27,000 people), while there is no worker housing in the area, workers mainly go home every day or stay in private boarding houses, so pandemic control for the labor force from outside the province is extremely difficult and complicated.

The recruitment of new workers for production and business activities of enterprises has also been affected because enterprises temporarily suspend the recruitment of workers from outside provinces, even areas that have not yet had the pandemic, to ensure safety for pandemic prevention and control. In fact, the qualifications and skills of workers in IPs are still low; the number of untrained workers and female employees still account for a high percentage, some enterprises and some employees have not yet strictly complied with the provisions of the State law in general and the labor law in particular. Therefore, this is really a difficult problem that requires the Vinh Phuc Industrial Parks Authority to solve thoroughly, in order to gradually improve the quality of human resources, and at the same time to help businesses stabilize human resources for production and to ensure income and living conditions for workers.

So, in order for labor management in IPs to be highly effective, what specific activities and solutions have you implemented?

In order to effectively manage labor in the IPs, over the past time, Vinh Phuc Industrial Parks Authority has promoted the propaganda, dissemination and education of the law for local employers and employees; paid attention to implementing welfare regimes and policies for employees; proposed Vinh Phuc province to build housing projects for workers and cultural institutions, serving the daily needs of workers. We have coordinated with professional agencies in enhancing training and fostering professional qualifications and job skills for employees; supporting and assisting enterprises in labor recruitment; well performed the prevention and control of COVID-19 in IPs, supported workers who are in difficulty due to the impact of the pandemic; strengthened the inspection and examination of the management and use of labor; and stepped up the application of information technology in labor management.

Simultaneously, we have promoted emulation and commendation, organized and launched movements of labor emulation, good production and business activities, promoted initiatives and technical improvements to enterprises and employees to create momentum to encourage enterprises and employees to enthusiastically strive for high achievements in working and production. With effective and practical solutions in labor management, in general, the quality of labor in IPs has been gradually improved. The enterprises in the IPs have strictly and fully complied with the regime for employees, properly resolving problems in labor relations.

The situation of the COVID-19 pandemic is still complicated and unpredictable, and labor management in IPs will certainly face many challenges. In the coming time, what key tasks will you focus on implementing?

The situation of the COVID-19 pandemic is still complicated, leading to many consequences, requiring us to make great efforts and to promote their role, effectiveness and efficiency in the State management in general and the labor management in IPs in particular. In the coming time, we will continue to perform well a number of key tasks as follows:

We will closely monitor the production and business situation of enterprises, grasp the difficulties, obstacles and fluctuations of enterprises due to the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic to promptly remove difficulties for enterprises to maintain stable production and business; continue to well implement the prevention and control of the COVID-19 pandemic; resolve the recommendations of enterprises, implement support solutions, remove difficulties and obstacles in order to improve operational capacity and competitiveness for enterprises, expand markets to boost production activities. For difficulties and problems, recommendations beyond our competence, we will summarize and propose competent authorities to direct and guide businesses to solve; coordinate with the Department of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs to continue implementing guidelines and policies on developing high-quality human resources. We will continue to survey the recruitment needs of enterprises in the IPs as a basis for consulting and propose to the province to develop training mechanisms and policies according to the needs of enterprises, have training forms according to the needs of enterprises. We will also strengthen linkage activities between State agencies, training institutions and enterprises in training and job creation to meet the increasing requirements of the quality of human resources; step up the work of guiding and supervising enterprises to build a harmonious, stable and progressive labor relationship in enterprises; strengthen propaganda and guide enterprises to implement policies, documents and laws; regularly innovate labor management methods to achieve the best efficiency, creating all conditions for enterprises to feel secure in production and business.

We will recommend the Provincial People's Committee to build housing and social institutions for employees; enhance the provision of information, propaganda, dissemination and education of labor laws for employees and employers, help employees to harmoniously settle their social relationships, and avoid conflicts in the relationship with their employers.

By Vietnam Business Forum