In China, there are three main categories of labour migrants: 1) contracted projects: those employed by Chinese companies on contracted projects overseas; 2) international labour service cooperation: those who are placed by Chinese intermediaries to work in enterprises overseas; 3) and those individual labour migrants going overseas for employment using the services of an overseas employment agency. Although numerous regulations have been developed relating to the first two categories, there are less regulations on the third.

 Contracted projects for foreign companies originated in the framework of China’s overseas aid projects in the 1950s to assist developing countries with infrastructure development. During the 1980s, state-owned enterprises started conducting commercial projects for overseas clients and more recently private enterprises entered the market. On the other hand, international labour service cooperation is a much more recent development in China, and began in the 1990s. While individual labour migration is happening at a comparatively smaller scale.

 Currently, outbound labour migration from China is on the rise, and has been recognised as an employment source of revenue and employment by the PRC government. According to the Ministry of Commerce, in the first six months of 2012, China sent 216,000 people to work abroad, up 2.4 per cent from a year earlier. "The foreign exchange revenues brought in by sending workers abroad has surpassed $4 billion each year and more than 4 million people's livelihoods have been improved," – Mr. Chen Deming, Minister of Commerce.

 According to the website of Chinese Ministry of Commerce, Labor service personnel dispatched overseas in 2013 amounted to 527 thousand, 15 thousand more than that of 2012. Of which labors dispatched for contracted projects were 271 thousand, and for labor service cooperation were 256 thousand. Labor service personnel overseas by the end of 2013 were 853 thousand, 3 thousand more than that of 2012.

According to the data collected by the World Bank, the migrant remittance inflows and outflows of China were 57,799 and 4,274 US million dollars in 2012. A report titled Migration and Development Brief by the World Bank in late 2011, China received an estimated $57 billion in global remittances last year, 11.8 percent up from the previous year, and is closing in on India, the current top destination for sending money home. It received $58 billion in global remittances last year, 5.5 percent more than in 2010. In 2011, according to the World Bank, India tops the league with a total of US$58 billion, with China second with US$57 billion. In 2013, the remittance from oversee Chinese reaches US$ 60 billion, second to India among all states.

Recently, the State Council has passed the new Regulations of Foreign Service Cooperation, which will come into effect 1 August 2012. Similar to previous regulations, international labour cooperation companies are required to pay for social insurance, as well as pre-departure training International labour cooperation companies should also purchase accidental health insurance for labour migrants (except in cases where the overseas employer does so), and also put down a 3 million yuan deposit to be used in case labour migrants require: reimbursement of their service fee (when overseas employers violate regulations); return and rescue in case of accidents; compensation; emergency assistance, return or first aid. This is linked China’s government recent need to evacuate over 809,000 Chinese migrants living in Libya.

Deputy Director CHEN Hongying,

Department of International Trade and Economic Affairs,

Chinese Ministry of Commerce