Guangdong was expected to face a labor shortage of more than 1 million this year, a governmental survey said Saturday.

The survey on migrant workers in the Pearl River Delta, conducted by the Guangdong Provincial Statistics Bureau, indicated that the labor force shortage, which first appeared last year, was worsening in the Pearl River Delta.

The survey polled 329 out of 33,000 foreign-invested, private and Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan-funded companies, each of which employed more than 50 workers, in nine cities in the Pearl River Delta.

Since the first half of 2004, 72.9 percent of the companies surveyed had difficulties in recruiting workers, according to the survey.

The shortage, which mainly involved ordinary workers, was mainly attributed to the low pay offered by labor-intensive enterprises in the area.

Fang Chaogui, director of the provincial labor and social security department, said the region was only short of workers paid 500 yuan (US$60) or below per month, workers aged between 18 and 25, women workers and those with specific skills.

The monthly salary for migrant workers in Guangdong stands at 500 to 1,000 yuan on average.

"If a company could provide a monthly salary of 1,000 yuan and above, it will not have difficulty in recruiting workers,” said Fang.

(Shenzhen Daily February 7, 2005)