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Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO]

21 May 2018 11:56 (UTC+04:00)
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO]

By Sara Israfilbayova

The Ministry of Labor and Social Protection of the Population of Azerbaijan will continue to work to eliminate informal employment and further improve the social welfare of the country’s population.

Minister Sahil Babayev made the remarks at the conference “Towards sustainable development goals: promoting long-term development and decent work” on May 12 in Baku.

The minister noted that over the past years Azerbaijan has achieved significant success in providing employment and improving the social well-being of the population.

He said Azerbaijan has managed to reduce poverty and unemployment and increase wages in a short period of time.

“Over the past 15 years, the country’s GDP has grown 3.2 times. The minimum wage increased 5.2 times, the average wage rose by 6.6 times. It is important that the poverty rate in the country has decreased from 49 percent to five percent. In addition, the unemployment rate was also reduced to five percent. During this period, more than $230 billion were invested in Azerbaijan, about half of which fell on foreign investments,” Babayev said.

He said that the ministry has such tasks as the fight against informal employment, an even greater improvement in social welfare, increase of employment, creation of new jobs and so on.

“The ministry is trying to improve the targeting of social policy, and to link social policy with employment. Our steps are based on the principle of tripartism, which was developed in cooperation with the International Labour Organization. That is, each of our steps is evaluated from the point of view of the government, the employer and the employee, and the best proposals are prepared,” Babayev said.

The country’s Deputy Prime Minister Ali Ahmadov addressing the event said that the goals of sustainable development are one of the most important directions of activity of the Azerbaijani government.

Ahmadov underlined that one of the most important factors in the world for changing people’s lives is labor-related, and the Azerbaijani government is taking all the necessary steps to provide citizens with decent work.

“As many as 1.9 million new work places have been created in Azerbaijan over the past 15 years, which is about 40 percent of the active population in Azerbaijan,” he said.

He stressed that Azerbaijan is among the countries with rapid population growth, which amounts to up to 1.2 percent per year.

“This is quite a big figure, which makes it necessary to create more than 100,000 jobs annually,” Ahmadov said.

He added that 46 percent of Azerbaijan’s population are people under the age of 29 years.

“This sets important tasks to provide the youth with work. The necessary steps in this direction will be continued,” he concluded.

Karabakh conflict creating problems for employment

Ahmadov went on saying that the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is creating serious problems for ensuring employment in Azerbaijan.

Ahmadov noted that as a result of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Azerbaijanis were subjected to ethnic cleansing by Armenia.

He underlined that as a result, more than a million people have become refugees and internally displaced persons, adding that it is a big task to provide more than a million people with decent work.”

The Deputy PM noted that on the other hand, the fact that Azerbaijan’s territories occupied by Armenia aren’t used for agriculture purposes creates problems.

The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. As a result of the ensuing war, in 1992 Armenian armed forces occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding regions.

The 1994 ceasefire agreement was followed by peace negotiations. Armenia has not yet implemented four UN Security Council resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from the Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding regions.

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Sara Israfilbayova is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Sara_999Is

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz

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Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
Azerbaijan to continue fighting against informal employment [UPDATE/PHOTO] - Gallery Image
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