Cambodia launches new jobs strategy for next decade

The Cambodian government has unveiled its national jobs strategy for the next decade, gearing up for the challenges and opportunities of ASEAN integration and the kingdom's continued economic rise, local media reported Friday.

Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen said the strategy aimed to increase job opportunities, improve governance of the labor market, and promote skills development, especially in critical areas that will be the first to benefit from the dropping of labor barriers under the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) from year-end, according to the Khmer Times newspaper.

"The economy has now entered another development stage, approaching a lower-middle-income country and in the process of structural changes from being agriculture-based country to be an industrial one," Hun Sen was quoted by the newspaper as saying at the launching ceremony here on Thursday.

The AEC will form a common market among ASEAN's 10 member countries, dropping barriers to trade and the flow of labor as well as harmonizing tax laws and other regulations.

The first stage of freeing the flow of labor will cover seven professions: engineering, nursing, architecture, medicine, dentistry, accountancy and tourism. Measures to improve labor mobility will be mutual recognition of trade and professional qualifications.

The official unemployment rate is just 1.4 percent, according to the Asian Development Bank.

Indeed, the strategy itself says about 80 percent of men 15 years and older are employed and about three quarters of eligible women are.

But the vast majority are in low-paying, unskilled jobs. The plan estimates that more than 230,000 young people enter the labor force every year. Almost two-thirds work in agriculture before moving into the industry and services sector.

To cater to the young people entering the market, and to attract more investment to Cambodia, the policy calls for a focus on "health, education and work-related skills."

"Skills development of young women and men and of workers who currently engage in low-productivity and low-income jobs, is clearly the way forward," the policy says.