Third stage of employment campaign to focus on remote areas

AMMAN — The Ministry of Labour will launch the third stage of the National Employment Campaign on Sunday, with 18,000 job opportunities on offer, a government official on Saturday.

The campaign will be launched at Al Hussein Sports City, where job seekers will meet with business owners over 15 days, Labour Ministry Secretary General Hamadah Abu Nejmeh told The Jordan Times over the phone.

“More than 100 private firms will take part in the campaign, offering young Jordanians employment opportunities in different sectors,” he said.

The Labour Ministry launched the National Employment Campaign in January 2013 with the goal of creating thousands of jobs for Jordanians in cooperation with the private sector.

More than 12,000 unemployed Jordanians were secured jobs during the first phase of the campaign, titled “We are all partners.”

The second stage of the campaign, launched on December 15 with the aim of creating 25,000 job opportunities in 11 sectors, witnessed a “huge turnout” of job seekers. 

“The third campaign, however, will be different. It focuses on remote areas and suburbs of the governorates. The campaign seeks to attract the unemployed in distant areas and villages,” Abu Nejmeh said.

Over the past week, ministry personnel have been touring remote areas across the governorates to inform people about the campaign, he added, noting that the ministry will provide free transportation to the campaign’s headquarters at Al Hussein Sports City daily to facilitate job seekers’ mission in securing employment opportunities.

“This campaign will also focus on providing more jobs in the industrial sector and encourage women to secure soft loans for starting income-generating projects,” Abu Nejmeh highlighted.

The government official stressed that the job market in the Kingdom is shifting from academic majors to more technical majors.

“Job seekers majoring in academic specialisations and certain IT fields are facing more difficulties in securing jobs. On the other hand, there is great demand in the market for technical majors, especially with the current construction boom in Aqaba and the Dead Sea, for example,” he noted.

In May this year, Labour Minister Nidal Katamine announced the results of a study evaluating the satisfaction of Jordanians under the national campaign, which secured jobs for 32,000 job seekers in the private sector. 

The study, carried out by a local research company, showed that 36 per cent of the 32,000 had quit their jobs six months after recruitment due to low salaries, the impact of work on their studies, incompatibility of their educational background with the job requirements, and transportation challenges.

It also revealed that 62 per cent of those who remained employed are satisfied with their jobs, and that those employed in the construction and communication sectors tend to keep their jobs, compared to other sectors.

Labour Ministry figures indicate that the unemployment rate currently stands at 11.8 per cent.