College graduates could take jobless rate beyond 5%

An opposition party legislator warned yesterday that the nation's 3.89 percent unemployment rate could see a sharp increase to over 5 percent next month when approximately 200,000 graduates nationwide flood into the job market.

People First Party Legislator Chou Hsi-wei (周錫偉) reminded the government to be prepared to respond to the influx of the "unemployed graduate population" to avoid a worsening of the nation's jobless situation.

He urged the government to help students develop secondary skills so that they will be able to meet the requirements of the industries that still have a large number of job openings.

At present approximately 380,000 people in Taiwan -- which has a population of 23 million -- are unemployed.

Citing figures released by 104 Manpower Bank, a local Internet job search and headhunting company, Chou said that most of the industries showing a pressing demand for workers are high-tech in nature.

The top 10 industries lacking manpower are electronics parts, import and export trade, computer peripherals, optical telecommunication products, semiconductors, software, Internet-based companies, retail, plastics and medical equipment, he said.

The top 10 industries with full employment are newspapers, telecommunication services, computer systems, schools, advertising and marketing, commodity shipping and storage, radio and television, restaurants, travel and financial investment.

Another New Party legislator, Lai Shyh-bao (賴世葆), announced that he and over 100 academics and economics experts have formed a "volunteer mission" to counsel the nation's industries and help the government combat the rising unemployment rate.

Touting a do-it-yourself attitude instead of what he called jumping on the bandwagon to criticize the government for its inadequacies, Lai -- himself once an academic -- called on his former colleagues from around the nation to "take the pulse" of the local industries and help small and medium-sized enterprises improve their competitiveness.

Together with some 20 professors -- some deans of management or business schools or directors of graduate schools -- Lai declared that the group will take on the role of professional advisers for both industry and government a/nd serve as a bridge of communication between the two to compensate for the inadequacies of the current system.

He added that the group will combine theory and practice to provide advice on financial and economic policies as well as their execution.

Hopefully, he said, the group can help lower the unemployment rate and help to create more jobs for people.