Many demands, but difficult to recruit enough labor
Mr. Luu Kim Hong - Chairman of the Trade Union of Nidec Vietnam Company, a business specializing in manufacturing electric motors, located in Ho Chi Minh City High-Tech Park - said that the company is in need of recruiting about 600 workers, however, this recruitment is not easy when only more than 10 people can be recruited each day.
Every day I go to train new employees about the production process and company regulations, the class only has more than ten people, not meeting the expectations of recruitment needs" - Mr. Hong said.
Information from PouYuen Vietnam Co., Ltd. also shows that, to meet production needs, the company has a need to recruit 4,000 workers. In addition to salaries and bonuses for the 13th month, the company also has policies to buy 24/7 occupational accident insurance, support workers with money to send their children to nurseries and kindergartens, and have cars to pick up and drop off workers in neighboring areas of the company. However, recruitment has not yet met the demand when from the beginning of the year to now, only about 1,000 workers have been recruited.
Similarly, Mr. Huynh Van Choi - CEO of Viet Hung Joint Stock Company - said that the company still needs to recruit more than 200 workers with a salary of about 9 million VND/person/month and an income of 11 million VND/person/month to meet the garment line, but has not been able to recruit. According to Mr. Choi, for the garment industry in Ho Chi Minh City, the income of more than 11 million VND/person/month plus bonuses for holidays and Tet is not low, but it is still difficult to recruit workers.
Maintain high recruitment demand
Ms. Nguyen Van Hanh Thuc - Director of the Ho Chi Minh City Employment Service Center - said that the center's statistics in the first quarter of 2026 show that the recruitment demand of businesses in Ho Chi Minh City continues to be maintained at a high level. The recruitment demand through the Ho Chi Minh City Employment Service Center is 82,762 job positions, while only 52,641 workers have job search needs. Thus, the recruitment demand is nearly 1.6 times higher than the job search demand.
Analysis by the Ho Chi Minh City Employment Service Center shows that, for job seekers, this force is unevenly distributed in Ho Chi Minh City, mainly concentrated in areas with many industrial zones and clusters and business - service activities developing. The age and qualifications of job seekers are diverse, but the age group from 36 - 49 accounts for a superior proportion, the group with high school level or below is more dominant, the gap between male and female ratios is not too large.
In the opposite direction, the leading recruitment demand is the group of unskilled workers and simple jobs with 27,626 job positions (accounting for 33.38%), showing a large demand from the manufacturing, service and retail industries, which require recruiting a large number of workers with flexible input conditions.
Next is the machine operation - production group with training and skills with 12,756 positions (accounting for 15.41%), reflecting the stable demand for a workforce with basic technical skills in the industrial sector. In the commercial and business - sales sector, 9,197 positions were recorded (accounting for 11.11%), showing the important role of distribution and consumption activities in Ho Chi Minh City's job structure.
According to the assessment of the Ho Chi Minh City Employment Service Center, businesses are increasing recruitment to serve production and business plans in the early stages of the year, especially in the fields of industrial production, trade - services, logistics and retail. The labor market is still in a state of shortage of workers with appropriate skills or experience in some industries. The difference between the recruitment requirements of businesses and the quality of labor supply shows that the labor market still has a certain gap between supply and demand, especially for positions requiring professional qualifications or skills.
