Shortage of Skilled Production Workers in China Continues... "Potential Crisis Ahead"

"Impact on China Manufacturing 2025 Plan"
"Concerns Over Vicious Cycle of Rising Wages and Employment Decline"

As the shortage of skilled production workers continues, China’s plan to normalize the economy through the transition to With-Corona appears to be facing obstacles. There are observations that the severe labor shortage in related fields could become a significant hurdle to the medium- to long-term goal of narrowing the technological gap in the global supply chain.

On the 6th, Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post (SCMP) reported, “The mismatch between the jobs young people want and the fields with urgent demand is growing,” adding, “The shortage of skilled workers will have a broad impact on efforts to revitalize the economy after a difficult three years under the zero-COVID system.” Citing a report from China Zheshang Securities last month, it stated, “Most of the core technologies and middleware supplies in China’s manufacturing sector heavily rely on foreign countries,” diagnosing that “the main obstacle is related to manpower, and China is facing a shortage of skilled production workers due to demographic and social changes.”

[Image source=AP Yonhap News]

According to SCMP, Cindy Zheng, CFO of WAGO (Tianjin), a global electrical and electronic engineering company, recently lamented at a European Chamber of Commerce event that although orders surged with the reopening of workplaces, it was extremely difficult to recruit skilled production workers. She said, “Recently, young people in China prefer flexible work arrangements such as courier and delivery jobs, and young workers in their 20s tend to avoid manufacturing.”

She continued, “This trend will affect the government’s ‘Made in China 2025’ strategy, which aims to reduce China’s import dependence and elevate the high-tech industry to Western levels,” emphasizing, “A large number of skilled workers are needed to respond to changes in advanced manufacturing and smart manufacturing and to become a high-level research and development (R&D) manufacturing center.” The ‘Made in China 2025’ strategy, announced by the State Council of China on May 8, 2015, is an industrial upgrading plan aimed at revitalizing manufacturing, focusing on nurturing 10 core industries including information technology (IT), aerospace, new energy, and robotics. However, according to China’s Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, it is projected that by 2025, there will be a shortage of about 30 million manufacturing workers in China.

An anonymous shipyard owner told SCMP, “As wages for skilled workers continue to rise, production costs increase, which could cause a potential crisis in the future,” expressing concern that “this could lead to a vicious cycle of reduced profits, business contraction, and decreased employment.” In fact, China’s unemployment rate for those aged 16 to 24 recorded 18.1% in February, worsening further compared to 16.7% at the end of last year and 17.3% in January. This indicates that the employment situation has not improved despite the transition to With-Corona.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.