The significant impact and progress made by the ILO/PEP after its 8-year’s
successful operation in China, is something we should all be proud of.
As the title indicates, the ILO/Japan Inter-country Project on Strategic Approaches
towards Employment Promotion Project aims to provide models and
pilot strategic approaches to employment promotion. After successful implementation
of its first phase for developing employment promotion models for
rural low-income families in China, the second phase has also made great contributions
to the employment promotion for the laid-off and unemployed workers
in urban areas through carrying out SYB training and establishing a smallloan
credit guarantee fund and helping them to start-up their own businesses.
The good experience and practice in pilot cities of the second phase are already
used to support the formulation of a series of active employment policies at
national level.
As study shows that in most East and South-east Asia, small-and-mediumscale
businesses have been the engines of growth, providing employment and
helping to reduce those living in poverty. The ILO employment promotion
agenda puts strong emphases on the support of small and micro enterprises,
acknowledging the fact that most jobs worldwide are created in this sector of
the economy. At the moment of the project’s closure, the project useful experiences
are compiled, reported in a fascinating style and published to draw a
wider audience’s attention to the ILO’s concern in small enterprise development
and job creation in the context of decent work agenda. It’s our pleasure
to sharing the integrated ILO’s approach on promoting the small enterprise
development with the other relevant technical cooperation projects, donor communities
and international agencies.
It is hoped that the ILO, together with the Chinese government, will continue
to contribute to promoting the decent work through small enterprise development
and therefore to generate more job opportunities for both men and women
in China.