A total of 9.32 million urban Chinese found employment in the first nine months of the year, exceeding the 9 million target for the whole year, said the Ministry of Labor and Social Security Thursday.

This is the first time in recent years that China has met its yearly target three months ahead of time.

Government support and guidance are key factors in the achievement, said Zhou Tianyong, deputy director of the Research Office of the Party School of the CPC Central Committee.

About 3.92 million of the people finding new jobs were laid-off workers and another 990,000 people belonged to the "40-50 group", referring to men aged 50 or higher and women older than 40.

The rest are graduates from vocational schools and institutions of higher learning, migrant rural laborers and others.

The ministry said there are still 8.35 million urban residents on the dole, with the official unemployment rate standing at 4.1 percent, 0.1 percentage points down from the first half of the year.

With an estimated 10 million urban Chinese joining the labor force each year, and 14 million laid-off workers hunting for jobs, China still faces huge employment pressure.

To encourage enterprises to employ laid-off workers, the central government will provide 25.1 billion yuan (US$3.1 billion) of subsidies this year, 4.2 billion yuan more than last year.

Meanwhile, China has made "a relatively high employment rate" a major goal in building a harmonious society by 2020.

A source with the Ministry said they will now focus on improving reemployment, especially in the less developed central and western areas and the old industrial bases, where there are big pools of workers laid off from bankrupt or shut-down enterprises.

The government will also implement policies aimed at encouraging college graduates to find jobs in the remote west and in grass-roots units, or to start their own business.

Official data show that more than 9 million urban Chinese found employment in each of the past few years, but that the country's average 10 percent economic growth over the past two decades was no longer able to mop up surplus labor.

"The economic boom is no longer providing as much employment," said Mo Rong, deputy chief of the labor science research institute under the Ministry.

He said that a lot of China's roaring investment fails to create many jobs. The country needed to develop the service sector and promote small and medium sized enterprises, which can create more jobs, said Mo.

(Xinhua News Agency October 27, 2006)