At least 20 million migrant workers remain unemployed due to the global financial crisis, a government official has said. Reuters reports:
But Chen Xiwen, director of the Office of the Central Rural Work Leading Group, said China had not witnessed a new wave of migrants returning jobless to the countryside since factories started reopening a month ago after the week-long Lunar New Year holiday.
“According to surveys and statistics by different departments, the finding is similar to what I’ve said before — 20 million, or slightly more,” Chen told a news conference on the sidelines of the annual meeting of parliament.
It was Chen on February 2 who made public the estimate of 20 million, or about 15 percent of China’s 130 million migrants who have left the land temporarily in search of work in cities.
