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Employment

Youth Employment Support

The department operates two youth employment resource centres called 'Youth Employment Start' to offer one-stop advisory and support services to young people aged between 15 and 29 to improve their chances of employment, and to help them secure sustainable employment or self-employment. In 2015, the two centres provided services to 73,394 young people.

Working Holiday Scheme

Since 2001, Hong Kong has established bilateral working holiday arrangements with 10 economies: Australia, Austria, Canada, France, Germany, Ireland, Japan, New Zealand, South Korea and the United Kingdom (UK). The scheme enables Hong Kong youths aged 18 to 30 to broaden their horizons by experiencing foreign culture through living and working temporarily overseas while holidaying, and allows youths from the partner economies to learn more about Hong Kong.

Austria and the UK allow Hong Kong youths to stay for up to six and 24 months respectively. The remaining eight partners issue working holiday visas to Hong Kong youths to stay in their economies for up to 12 months for holidaying, taking up short-term employment to supplement their travel expenses, and/or studying short-term courses (except Ireland).

As at end-2015, the scheme had recorded around 70,000 Hong Kong youth participants and welcomed more than 6,000 youths from the partner economies to Hong Kong.

Employees Retraining Board (ERB)

The ERB is a statutory body set up under the Employees Retraining Ordinance. The board provides, under its Manpower Development Scheme, market-driven training and employment support services through about 100 appointed training bodies that operate a total of around 400 training centres. People aged 15 or above with education attainment up to sub-degree level may enrol on its full-time, placement-tied courses and half-day or evening generic skills training courses or courses under the Skills Upgrading Scheme Plus. As at December 2015, there were around 700 courses covering 28 industries.

Dedicated Training

The ERB provides training and employment support to young people, new arrivals from the Mainland, ethnic minorities, people with disabilities, people who have recovered from work injuries, and rehabilitated former drug abusers and former offenders. It organises dedicated training programmes targeting young people of different backgrounds and aspirations to increase their employment opportunities.

Employment Support Services

The ERB's Smart Living Scheme and Smart Baby Care Scheme provide referral services for participants who complete its training in domestic help, elderly and patient care, healthcare massage, post-natal care or infant and child care.

The board also operates three service centres in Kowloon East, Kowloon West and Tin Shui Wail to provide people in those districts with training and employment support.

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