Demand for personnel on the rise

After a dismal end to last year and a slow start this year, the development indices of the Suzhou Industrial Park (SIP) have perked up.

According to Ma Minglong, secretary of the Communist Party of China SIP Working Committee, recruitment in the park has been on the rise since the beginning of April.

SIP is seeing a plethora of job fairs being organized each week. More than 110 enterprises in the SIP attended a recent fair, offering 2,000 jobs in machinery, electronics and service sectors, organizers said.

"We are planning to hire 10 people in our client service section," said Xu Yang, marketing manager of the Suzhou Branch of Everbright Securities Co, Ltd, at a job fair at SIP.

"Recruitment in the Park has been on the rise since the beginning of April, with orders of companies increasing, as compared with the past several months," Ma said.

This boom in demand for personnel is taking place, as companies in the Park seek to expand their businesses even in the face of the economic downturn.

"The slowdown of the overall macro-economy does not represent the stop of a company's development," said Xu. "We are confident of an economic revival in the second half of the year."

The SIP, a joint project established in 1994 between China and Singapore, currently has more than 12,000 companies that include 1,400 Sino-foreign joint ventures.

"After SIP's worst period from November through January, basic development indices in the park have shown positive changes," Ma said. He also said the Park realized an 8.5 percent growth year-on-year, in its financial revenue for the first quarter.

The SIP Administrative Committee has taken several measures to help companies overcome the difficulties brought about by the global downturn. It has earmarked 200 million yuan to help small and medium-sized enterprises get bank loans," said Ma.

Encouraged by this, imports and exports in the Park are in riviving. In March, the park's volume of imports and exports reached $3.8 billion, up 24.5 percent from February.

Premier Wen Jiabao has said that China's economy showed signs of better-than-expected changes during the first quarter as a result of the economic stimulus package.

Companies in SIP are also optimistic about their businesses bouncing back.

Lee Byung-chul, Samsung's regional director for East China, said the global credit crisis would not affect Samsung's investment plan in China.

The company plans to double its production of laptops in China, this year. Samsung is one of the earliest foreign-invested companies to have made SIP its base.

"China's policy to stimulate domestic demand made us believe that the country's economic growth recovery would come soon," he said.

For Positec Machinery (China) Co., Ltd, the company's sales revenue in the first quarter grew 18 percent year-on-year to reach $59 million, said Frank Wu, vice president. Positec machinery is a Suzhou-based company that produces tools such as electric drills and mowers, for exports.

Wu said that their low-end, practical and high-quality products were being welcome in overseas markets, contributing to their revenue growth.

The company plans to increase its investment in research and development to 60 million yuan, a hike of 30 to 50 percent this year, he added.

Xinhua

(China Daily 05/04/2009 page5)