国际劳工组织近日发布报告说，受国际经济危机影响，亚洲今年失业人口预计比去年增加720万，达9700万，失业率由4.8％上升至5.1％。报告说，按照最悲观地预测来看，亚洲失业人口甚至可能比去年增加2230万，达到1.13亿。要消化新增失业人口，亚洲各国需要在今明两年创造大约5100万个工作岗位。 该报告指出，穷人面临双重危机 —— 一方面，他们要为高价日用品花去大部分收入，另一方面，他们的生计又受到经济停滞威胁。国际劳工组织呼吁亚洲各国在拟定经济刺激计划时，重点关注保护就业和维持家庭购买力，因为这些因素会促进内需，进而迅速推动经济。

Asia is likely to have 7.2 million more jobless people in 2009 than last year due to fallout from the global economic crisis, raising the region's jobless rate to 5.1 percent, the International Labor¹ Organization said Wednesday.

It forecast the ranks of unemployed² workers would likely balloon to 97 million in 2009 in Asia, the world economy's star performer in recent years but where a third of the population still live on a little over $1 a day. Last year, the unemployment rate was 4.8 percent.

In the most pessimistic scenario³, the number of unemployed could swell⁴ to 113 million, or 22.3 million more than last year, the ILO said in a report on the crisis' fallout in Asia.

An estimated 51 million new jobs will be needed this year and next to absorb Asia's growing labor force, with most jobs needed in the region's giant economies - 20.3 million in India, 10.9 million in China and 3.6 million in Indonesia.

Countries with the highest rates of expected labor force growth through 2010 include Pakistan at 6.1 percent, Cambodia at 4.9 percent, and the Philippines at 4.9 percent.

"There is very little chance that a sufficient number of new jobs will be created in the region this year to keep up with expected labor force growth," the report added.

As fewer jobs are created at home, remittances⁵ from the region's army of migrant workers began to slow in the third quarter of 2008.

The Geneva-based ILO said the World Bank now forecasts an overall drop in remittances in 2009 - partly due to the deep recession in the US, which accounts for 44 percent of workers' money sent to East Asia and the Pacific, and 28 percent to South Asia.

"As global demand for workers contracts, the flow of migrant workers from developing Asia will moderate in 2009," the report said. "For labor-sending countries, this will exacerbate⁶ the challenge of mitigating⁷ job losses and generating new employment domestically."

Remittances comprise a third of gross domestic product in Tonga, 17 percent in Nepal, 11 percent in the Philippines, 9.7 percent in Bangladesh and 8.3 percent in Sri Lanka.

Declining production will also see a shift to informal, more vulnerable work that does not provide protection in case of job loss or illness, the report added.

It said the number of vulnerable Asian workers, estimated at 1.08 billion in 2008, could rise this year by 21 million, and in an extreme case, by 61 million.

"The poor face a double crisis- high costs for basic necessities on which they spend the majority of their income, along with economic stagnation⁸ that threaten their livelihoods," the ILO said.

Promoting employment and supporting household purchasing power is critical for any stimulus⁹ package, as these will drive domestic consumption needed to quickly bolster¹⁰ growth, it added.