YEREVAN, AUGUST 24, ARMENPRESS. The government approved a new state support program of ensuring employment which will incentivize employers who will hire unemployed persons, including  social benefit recipients. According to the program, in case of signing employment contracts with unemployed persons for at least a year, the government will provide a one-time compensation to the employer in the amount of 250,000 drams, and 350,000 drams in case of hiring a social benefit recipient.

Zhora Sargsyan, the Head of the Department of Labor and Employment at the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs, said during the ARMENPRESS Podcast that similar programs existed in the past as well, but given the changing demands of both employers and unemployed people this project is the revised option.

“Unemployed people aged 35 or above who’ve been registered as unemployed for at least the past three months are eligible for the program. If the unemployed person is a social benefit recipient then only that circumstance is sufficient to be eligible. In case of unemployed persons who are social benefit recipients the three-month registration and age limit is not a mandatory condition,” Sargsyan said.

There are several criteria in case of employers: the program is carried out only for private sector employers; employers who’ve been active in the market for at least two years at the time of application are eligible for the program; employers must also have had at least 10 employees in the three month before applying for the program whose income hasn’t declined in the period, or has declined not more than 5%.

If the employer is hiring a social benefit recipient unemployed person for seasonal work then they are eligible to sign the contract for a period of up to 8 months instead of a year.

Ani Danielyan

Photos by Mkhitar Khachatryan