Workers out of work, dormitory rooms deserted
Mr. Luong Ngoc Nhe is the owner of two boarding houses in Thanh Phu commune, Vinh Cuu district, Dong Nai province, with about 200 rooms. Previously, Mr. Nhe's two boarding houses were full of workers, but for many months now, his boarding house has had up to 60 vacant rooms, and many other workers are also preparing to leave their rooms and return to their hometowns. Although Mr. Nhe has a policy of reducing the rent for the rooms, there are still no workers renting them.
Mr. Nhe said that when checking out, the workers shared that because the company had no orders and little work, they looked for new jobs in other provinces such as Binh Duong, Ho Chi Minh City or returned to their hometowns. According to Mr. Nhe, many wood factories had no orders so the workers had no jobs, so they returned to their hometowns to find jobs at other companies, so now there are many vacant rooms.
In a similar situation, the 40-room boarding house of Ms. Nguyen Thi Kim Van, in Hamlet 1, Thanh Phu Commune, Vinh Cuu District, is currently empty with more than a dozen rooms without workers renting them.
According to the landlords, workers have had their working hours and income reduced and their jobs lost because the company has no production orders, making life difficult, so they had to give up their rooms and move elsewhere.
About 50,000 - 60,000 workers have moved
Mr. Nguyen Quoc An - Deputy Head of the Management Board of Industrial Parks in Dong Nai province - informed that the number of workers in industrial parks alone has decreased by nearly 16,000 due to the shift to other places. The formation of industrial parks in the Central and Northern provinces has made it easier for workers to move compared to the cramped life in boarding houses in Dong Nai.
“The movement of workers to different places signals change, we need to pay more attention to labor quality” - Mr. An shared.
According to the Dong Nai Provincial Labor Federation, the whole province has more than 1,300,000 workers, of which female workers account for about 67%, workers from other provinces account for about 60%, shifting towards increasing the proportion in the industrial and service sectors, increasing the informal sector, and emerging new forms of labor.
Since the COVID-19 pandemic, a large number of workers have moved from Dong Nai to other provinces, estimated at 50,000 - 60,000 people, mainly concentrated in the South Central, Southwest, and Central Highlands provinces.
According to information from the Dong Nai Provincial Federation of Labor, through reports from trade unions at all levels in the province, up to now, more than 11,270 union members and workers in the province have been affected because businesses are facing difficulties and are forced to reduce working hours and cut staff. The industries with the most job losses are the wood industry, because up to now, many companies have not received orders or are operating at a low level.
From now until the end of 2024, the Dong Nai Provincial Federation of Labor also requested that trade unions at all levels focus on stabilizing labor relations, grasping the situation of union members, workers who are underemployed, unemployed, and have their labor contracts suspended.
