Facing the graduation of a record 3 million college students throughout China next year, the central government is set to launch a nationwide service week from the beginning of next month as the young job-hunters prepare to leave campus next summer.

Hou Jianliang, vice-minister of personnel, announced at a press conference over the weekend that the service week will be officially launched from December 1 to 7 across China to offer free services for next year's college graduates through online information searching, on-the-spot consultations and face-to-face applications in job markets throughout China.

The vice-minister made it clear that, co-sponsored by his ministry and China Human Resources Association, "the service week will be held as a public welfare effort to help millions of college graduates."

During the week, Hou promised his ministry will play a leading role in offering related government policies for college graduates.

Hou said he hopes "all employers can hire as many college graduates as they can because, as a precious human resource, college graduates have only made up a small part of China's huge labour force."

"Making the full use of such resources is of vital importance for China to carry out its human resources strategy to propel sustainability of the economy and social progress in building a well-off society," Hou added.

College graduates in search of work will be "free of any charges" when obtaining information collected and issued by personnel agencies, registered job proxies and labour markets, websites for professionals and college-based online services for them, according to Si Yilei, executive vice-chairman of the association.

"Graduates have to face fierce job competition next year, as China has reported a peak in the number of graduates since colleges and universities have enlarged their enrollment since 1999," Hou said.

"Over 3 million college graduates are estimated to pour into the job market next year, including 2.8 million of 2004's graduates, marking an increase of 680,000 over 2003 and some 200,000 others from the previous years."

Si said his association and its affiliated China National Centre for Human Resources, which boast some 4,000 members, have accelerated their information collection and issuing for the forthcoming week.

Information will be focused on employment of next year's college graduates, particularly vacant positions of government agencies, public institutions, the State-owned enterprises, private enterprises, Sino-foreign founded joint ventures and high-tech firms.

To date, at least 90 State-run and local job markets, 60 special websites hunting for professionals have registered for the service week, including seven regional job fairs covering most provinces, autonomous regions, their capital cities and the country's coastal cities.

To ensure the legal rights of job hunters, the association will tighten its control over re-examination of related information, screening out any false or fraudulent data intended to generate illicit profits, Si said.

Two hotlines (010-8422-2648, 8422-6969) will be put into operation for applicants to report wrongdoing or discrimination they might experience during that week. College job-hunters can visit www. newjobs.com.cn for further information about the service week.

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