A woman sells flowers in a street of Hanoi

Minister of Labour, Invalid and Social Affairs Dao Ngoc Dung told Vietnam NewsAgency in a recent interview that only 270,000 rural-to-urban migrantworkers have bought voluntary social insurance, 0.8 per cent of the total 34million migrant workers, although the Government has issued many socialsecurity policies for migrant workers.

It is also estimated that about 500,000 Vietnamese labourers work abroad,a figure which increases by about 100,000 each year. Of which, only 6,000migrant workers have bought voluntary social insurance, Dinh Duy Hung, deputyhead of Vietnam Social Security's Department of Collection said.

Gaps in policy implementation were to blame for the situation, LeThanh Sang, President of Southern Institute of Social Sciences said.

There were many barriers stopping migrant workers from buying voluntary socialinsurance, Sang said.

The barriers include the mechanism of social management by householdregistration and limitations of policy dissemination, he said.

Moving elsewhere to find work meant implementing the policies via householdregistration was ineffective, he added.

“Migrant workers not only lose the support of social security policies intheir homeland but also have difficulties accessing the policies in theirnew destination,” he said.

Nguyen Trong Dam, former Deputy Minister of Labour, Invalid and Social Affairs,said poor migrant workers had not benefited from social security policiesin the place they migrated to because current regulations failed tomention them receiving social security benefits in the place they migrated to.

Minister Dung said the migrants' low and unstable incomes were also of concern,as are the complex administrative procedures for migrant workers to buysocial insurance.

Additionally, it took up to 20 years to buy social insurance before a buyercould receive a monthly pension. This made migrant workers hesitate to buy thevoluntary social insurance because they did not see the immediate benefits, Damadded.

Tran Hai Nam, deputy head of the ministry’s Social Insurance Department, saidalthough migrant workers were mentioned in some laws such as the law on socialinsurance, law on employment and the Labour Code, the number of migrant workerswho had bought social insurance was still limited.

This was because of inappropriate methods of dissemination, he said.
To tackle the problem, Namsaid migrant workers should be educated on the importance of socialinsurance via the Youth Union, Women’s Union and Farmers Association ratherthan via television or radio, which they rarely have time to watch or listen todue to their long working hours.

Managerial agencies were advised to issue comprehensive solutions to fixthe situation, he said.

The Government had run a policy of financial support for voluntarysocial insurance participants, but the support levels should be increased, headded.

Currently, a person belonging to the poor household list canreceive financial support of 30 percent from the State when they buyvoluntary social insurance. The financial support will be 25 percent for aperson on the near-poor household list.

The social insurance agency should reform administrative procedures to helpmigrant workers, Nam said. For migrant workers who work abroad, the Governmentas well as social the social insurance agency should sign bilateral agreementsto help them access the social security policies of the nations they moved to,he added./.VNA