Gov’t rolls out US$1.31 billion support package for the unemployed

The funding is sourced from the Unemployment Insurance Fund.

Beneficiaries are those who pay monthly unemployment insurance premiums but their labor contracts are terminated between January 1, 2020 and September 30, 2021.

The support policy is not applicable to employees working at State agencies, political organizations, socio-political organizations, people’s armed forces, public non-business units.

The amount of financial support for each beneficiary shall be decided as follows:

(i) VND1.8 million (US$79) for an unemployed worker having paid unemployment insurance premiums for under 12 months

(ii) VND 2.1 million (US$92) for an unemployed worker having paid unemployment insurance premiums for full 12 months to 60 months

(iii) VND 2.4 million (US$105) for an unemployed worker having paid unemployment insurance premiums for full 60 months to 84 months

(iv) VND 2.65 million (US$116) for an unemployed worker having paid unemployment insurance premiums for full 84 months to 108 months

(v) VND2.9 million (US$127) for an unemployed worker having paid unemployment insurance premiums for full 108 months to 132 months

(vi) VND3.3 million (US$145) for an unemployed worker having paid unemployment insurance premiums for full 132 months and above.

The policy shall be implemented from October 1 and completed no later than December 31, 2021.

In addition, employers shall be exempted from paying payable unemployment insurance premiums for their employees from October 1, 2021 to September 30, 2022.  

According to the General Statistics Office, up to 12.8 million laborers in Viet Nam have been affected by the current fourth wave of COVID-19 in the first half of 2021.

This package is a follow-up to a previous initiative of VND62 trillion (US$2.6 billion) Viet Nam issued last year for the poor and businesses hit by COVID-19, said Minister of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs Dao Ngoc Dung.

The financial support package released in April last year included nearly VND36 trillion (US$1.55 billion) from the central government and local administration budgets.

By Thuy Dung