China is improving women's employment and strengthening the training of women laid-off workers to help them get reemployed, an official on women and children’s affairs has said.

"Labor departments of the country have helped more than 376,000 laid-off women find new employment and put 103,000 women on public service posts during recent years," said Huang Qingyi, vice director of the women and children affairs committee of the State Council, China's cabinet.

More than 270,000 Chinese women have received employment training from labor departments, with 154,000 finding jobs or setting up their own businesses, Huang said.

Under a national project to help transfer rural laborers, the ministries of agriculture, finance, education and labor and social security have jointly organized training of more than three million rural laborers and helped more than 2.6 million find jobs in cities, with women making up 40 percent, she said.

However, Huang said, increasing working pressure and underdeveloped unemployment and maternity insurance is still a setback for Chinese working women.

About 21 percent of rural women in cities were fired after they became pregnant or had a child. A growing number of working women are delaying their motherhood for fear of losing jobs or promotion opportunities, according to a survey on the rights of rural female workers conducted by the All-China Women's Federation.

(Xinhua News Agency May 8, 2007)