Newly released statistics from the Ministry of Absorption here show that of 3,600 Ethiopian Jewish immigrants trained to work, only 250 are unemployed.
Some 58 percent of all adult Ethiopian immigrants are either working, studying or training professionally for jobs, according to the report presented last week in a meeting with Labor and Social Affairs Ministry directors.
Absorption Ministry Director General Meir Shamir told the directors at the meeting that all the Ethiopian youth are within an educational framework. About 4,700 children are studying in the school system, 2,400 are in Youth Aliya programs and about 1,000 older students are in the student authority pre-academic programs or professional training courses.
Most of the employed immigrants do some type of outdoor work, others work in factories or attend courses and Hebrew classes.
The Ministry heads met to discuss reducing the numbers of unemployed immigrants and improving integration into the work force for those immigrants who have not been trained. The discussions focused on organizing a comprehensive program of training prior to transferring the responsibility of the needy Ethiopian population to local welfare services.
Shamir advised the other Ministry heads to avoid setting up separate social service networks for new immigrants because this could make them permanently dependent on the absorption system and might hinder their integration into the society.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
