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French gov't upbeat about employment in 2015: labor minister

Xinhua, March 18, 2015 Adjust font size:

French Labor Minister Francois Rebsamen on Wednesday expressed optimism over reducing the number of jobless claims in 2015, betting on the government's incentives to bolster investments and create enough jobs for millions of jobseekers.

In an interview with Radio Classique and LCI, Rebsamen expected better results on jobless claim cuts this year than the previous one as "all policies to improve employment are implemented."

"At the end of 2015, we will have a stabilization or even a decline in unemployment," the minister stressed.

In January, France registered 19,100 fewer unemployed people to 3.48 million, down 0.5 percent compared to December figures, the first decline since August 2014, according to data released by the labor ministry.

"Things are improving. They are not going fast enough. We'll see how quickly they will go in 2015. We have put in place policies that have eased, facilitated and strengthened enterprises," the minister said.

After a broken promise to reverse the long rise in unemployment by the end of 2013, French President Francois Hollande is now aiming to reduce the number of jobless claims to less than 3 million by the end of his 2017 mandate.

With this target, he tried to stimulate hiring by offering companies a 30-billion-euro (31.78 billion U.S. dollars) cut in payroll charges, improving training, facilitating recruitment rules and pumping millions of euros into financing job contracts in the public sector. Endit