Kuwait Employment and Career News
Kuwaiti government strives to boost private sector jobs
Although citizens in Kuwait have always preferred jobs in the government sector, the situation has changed ever-since the State succeeded in motivating the youth to work in private sector.
With about 80 percent of citizens currently working in the government sector, which has led to a serious imbalance, the Kuwaiti government has been encouraging Kuwaitis to work in private sector to solve the imbalance.
According to statistics by the General Secretariat of Planning and Development, the number of Kuwaitis in private sector is about 44,000, as against the 311,000 Kuwaitis in government employment.
Most citizens working in the government sector are in desk jobs or as firemen or policemen, who constitute 42 percent, while those in vocational jobs constitute 3 percent, and technicians in engineering and medicine constitute 6 percent.
This imbalance had created numerous problems such as disguised unemployment in governmental bodies, increase in salary costs in state budget, etc. Although this issue was tolerated during the past decades, the steep decline in oil prices towards the end of nineties required reconsidering the costly employment policies.
In 2001, the government of Kuwait had passed a regulation supporting the private sector, so as to reduce the burden of employment requests on government bodies. The social allowances of workers were equalized in both sectors. Earlier, marriage and child allowances were given only for state employees.
A body, established under the Civil Service Commission (CSC), i.e., the Manpower and Government Restructuring Program (MGRP), is being made responsible for training citizens and placing them in private sector jobs.
The Head of MGRP’s legal department, Fawzi Al-Shireeda, said that the program was successful in increasing job opportunities for Kuwaitis in private sector. Ever-since its establishment in 2001, the MGRP has employed several Kuwaitis in private sector, showing annual increase.
About 12000 Kuwaitis joined private sector in 2007, constituting 42 percent of total citizens who were assigned jobs for the year.
The MGRP, together with various private sector bodies, has been holding career exhibitions every year, in various sectors such as tourism, banking, industry and the like.
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