The status of migrant workers throughout the country will be considered from Jan 1 next year while calculating the national unemployment rate, the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security has said.

The new policy will allow unemployed migrant workers to register with local governments to get a job. Some cities have already started experimenting with this policy.

It will also allow migrant workers who have worked in the same city for more than half a year at a stretch to register afresh for unemployment after being laid off. Migrant workers will be registered in a way that would allow them to use their registration and avail of the supportive policies even when employed in other regions.

Registration forms will be issued from Feb 5 to July 5 next year. The updated figures will be submitted to the central government every month, and the national unemployment network is expected to be complete by Jan 5, 2012.

Until this year, the official unemployment rate was calculated only on the basis of urban areas, which many believe did not give an accurate and comprehensive national index.

Zhang Juwei, deputy director of the Institute of Population and Labor Economics, affiliated to the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, considers the new policy very important because migrant workers are an indispensable part of the country's labor force. Now that migrant workers will be accounted for, the unemployment data will be more accurate and ensure that they get basic welfare, says Zhang, who is one of the leading experts in the study of unemployment rate.

China's rural population is about 720 million. More than 200 million of them have become migrant workers, fueling the country's urbanization and industrialization. They have shifted to cities for jobs, and the wages they earn have become a major source of income for their families. Some of them have settled down in cities, too, but they are not counted as unemployed even if they do not have jobs.

Zhang says that it is difficult to cover the entire rural population, but without the large number of migrant workers being accounted for, the unemployment rate cannot reflect facts.

Yang Yiyong, director of the Institute of Social Development Research, affiliated to the National Development and Reform Commission, says that in principle, all employable but jobless individuals should be part of the official unemployed list.

Accurate and timely assessment of the unemployment rate will be critical for designing appropriate and timely macroeconomic policies and social assistance programs. Therefore, taking migrant workers into account will be the first step toward reforming the unemployment index in China.