Megastory series: 'Thirst' for labor in the industrial capital of Dong Nai Last article: How to retain workers to achieve double-digit growth target?

According to experts' analysis, Dong Nai and Vietnam are both striving and determined to achieve the target of double-digit economic growth in 2025 and the following period. Considering this an important step in the process of socio-economic development, the economy must grow highly and sustainably. In particular, labor is a valuable resource, retaining labor will bring stable competitive advantages and ensure long-term development for both businesses and the country.

When it comes into operation at the end of 2026, Long Thanh Airport is expected to need nearly 14,000 workers, including more than 5,000 with university and post-graduate degrees. Photo: ACV

Associate Professor, Dr. Nguyen Duc Loc, Director of the Institute for Social Life Research, analyzed that labor migration does not only stop at the enterprise level, it also has impacts on the macro economy. The decline in the labor force can slow down economic growth, reduce overall labor productivity and put pressure on the social welfare system.

Immigrants leave, in the short term, labor-intensive industries are short of human resources, but also push the locality to quickly transform to adapt, creating new attraction. Especially in the near future, there will be a "wave" of investment in Dong Nai when Long Thanh Airport comes into operation, the transport infrastructure system develops and connects strongly. And this is an opportunity for the province to review the quality of investment attraction. However, to welcome billion-dollar giants, Dong Nai needs to identify the current situations and barriers, including human resources.

“From the process of shifting industries around the world , we can see that at a certain point, labor-intensive stages will leave urban areas to make way for high-tech and technical industries. Localities or the Government need to calculate and prepare to create new attractions from green economic sectors, circular economic sectors, digital economic sectors, innovation sectors... which are less labor-intensive,” said Associate Professor, Dr. Nguyen Duc Loc.

Lilama 2 International Technology College (Long Thanh district) provides high-quality vocational training to serve the workforce for Long Thanh Airport. Photo: Bich Nhan

At the 2025 Meeting with nearly 400 foreign-invested enterprises in Dong Nai province, Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee Vo Tan Duc said that fluctuations in the world situation, as well as subjective and objective obstacles in production and business, have created difficulties, challenges and opportunities. In 2025, along with the whole country, Dong Nai will continue to promote administrative procedure reform, further improve the quality of human resources and infrastructure, and create a favorable investment environment for enterprises. Increasing automation and applying technology in production is also a potential solution to reduce dependence on manual labor.

“The province not only focuses on attracting investment but also wants to improve investment quality, attract investment projects in the fields of modern technology, supporting industry, semiconductor industry, green technology, environmental friendliness, with the orientation of sustainable development, improving the competitiveness of the province” - Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee Vo Tan Duc affirmed.

Union meal for workers of Changshin Vietnam Co., Ltd. worth 50,000 VND/meal. Photo: VNA

According to the Department of Home Affairs, recently, enterprises have cooperated with Dong Nai Employment Service Center, and supply units have arranged direct personnel to many localities for recruitment. Not only limited to the locality, Dong Nai Employment Service Center has organized direct job fairs and online connections with 13 provinces in the Southwest and the Central Highlands. This is a quick and effective way to supplement labor resources for enterprises.

The Department of Home Affairs said that to overcome difficulties in recruiting and retaining workers, in addition to local support policies, departments and branches require businesses to implement social security policies well and have good salary and bonus policies to retain skilled workers.

From the beginning of April 2025, Topband Smart Dong Nai Vietnam Co., Ltd. (Long Thanh district) decided to increase the salary by 1 million VND/person for 3,000 employees working at the company. This policy has been carefully considered and the company's Board of Directors decided to implement it immediately.

Ms. Yang Jia Yan, Human Resources Director, Topband Smart Dong Nai Co., Ltd. shared: “Currently, the average income of workers without overtime is 7.8 million VND/month, if overtime, the income is from 10-13 million VND/person. During the recent Lunar New Year, in addition to Tet bonuses, the company also increased benefits to improve the lives of workers. With these policies, workers feel secure in their work and the company's recruitment of new employees has had positive results.”

At Changshin Vietnam Co., Ltd., there are 3 factories in Vinh Cuu District, Long Thanh District and Tan Phu District with more than 42 thousand people. Every year, the Executive Board of the Trade Union coordinates with the Board of Directors of the company to organize tours for all workers in Vung Tau, Phan Thiet, Da Lat... Improving working conditions and enhancing welfare have attracted and retained the company's employees.

Checking the quality of television products at Regza Electronics Vietnam Co., Ltd. (Long Thanh Industrial Park. Photo: Hoang Hieu

According to experts, to minimize the negative impacts of labor shortages, the government and businesses need to have proactive and comprehensive strategies. This includes investing in training and upgrading skills for the domestic workforce, creating an attractive and competitive working environment to attract and retain workers.

In the first quarter of 2025, the Government has continuously launched a series of actions, focusing on developing social housing to create opportunities for people to settle down. At the end of February 2025, the Prime Minister requested to study and immediately implement a credit package program to support people under 35 years old to buy houses. In early March 2025, the Prime Minister directed to study the establishment of a National Housing Fund, developing low-cost housing in large cities. Also in March, a national conference was held to remove difficulties and obstacles, and promote the development of social housing.

The actions of the Government, ministries and branches are increasingly showing flexibility, not general but detailed and specific. This is the necessary factor to create breakthrough results and bring practical value. Thanks to these actions, the results achieved are quite positive.

Social housing A6-A7, Bien Hoa city, Dong Nai province. Photo: Minh Tai

According to the provincial People's Committee, Dong Nai has planned 700 hectares of land for the development of social housing and workers' housing in the 2021-2030 period. In addition, the province has about 350 hectares of land fund of 20% in commercial housing projects. Thus, with a total of more than 1,000 hectares of land, this basically meets the goal of building at least 50,000 social housing units in the 2021-2030 period, nearly 2.5 times higher than the target assigned by the Government to Dong Nai in the 2025-2030 period.

Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee Ho Van Ha said that currently, the total number of workers in industrial parks in Dong Nai is more than 595 thousand people, of which, workers from other provinces account for 48.6%. Most of them have housing needs. Currently, the province is implementing 10 projects with a scale of 13 thousand apartments and has approved the investment policy. The province is currently selecting investors for 7 projects with a scale of 8 thousand apartments.

"With enough public land to build at least 50,000 social housing units and workers' housing, this is a very large number and is important to help people settle down and find work," said Mr. Ha.

Faced with the trend of workers leaving industrial parks, the Dong Nai Provincial Federation of Labor also actively consulted with the Provincial People's Committee and related departments and branches to remove difficulties in developing social housing for workers, and proposed building cultural institutions, kindergartens, and medical stations in industrial parks.

Not stopping there, the Union focuses on vocational skills training for workers through a number of vocational training schools in Dong Nai. Many short-term training models are linked to practical requirements, linking with businesses to create jobs immediately after training. With synchronous solutions, Dong Nai Union hopes to work with businesses to build a more attractive working environment, retain workers, and contribute to ensuring sustainable development for Dong Nai province in the new period.

Source: https://baodongnai.com.vn/media/megastory/202505/loat-megastory-khat-lao-dong-giua-thu-phu-cong-nghiep-dong-nai-bai-cuoi-giu-chan-nguoi-lao-dong-bang-nhung-gi-de-dat-muc-tieu-tang-truong-2-con-so-2f6359f/