Xinhua reports China has promoted the implementation of work-relief programmes by local governments in key projects as well as agricultural and rural infrastructure projects to boost employment, the country’s top economic planning body said. In the first three quarters of 2024, these programmes created a total of 2.45 million jobs for low-income workers, a year-on-year increase of 30.2%, and distributed RMB 31 billion (about USD 4.36 billion) in wages, up 22.7% from a year earlier, according to the National Development and Reform Commission.

These work-relief programmes are aimed at people in need of employment, especially rural residents who have been lifted out of poverty, vulnerable individuals prone to returning to poverty, and migrant workers who have gone back to their home-towns. The commission will continue to give full play to the role of these programmes in creating jobs for low-income workers and increasing their incomes, it said.