Committee on Labor, Employment and Social Protection: in the Vitebsk region, more than 50 percent of disabled people who applied to the employment service find the desired job

The Committee for Labor, Employment, and Social Protection of the Vitebsk Regional Executive Committee pays special attention to assisting people with disabilities in finding employment and ensuring their effective employment.

Legislation provides for additional measures aimed at ensuring their employment. Furthermore, legislation guarantees people with disabilities the right to work, prohibits discrimination in the labor sphere based on disability, and includes specific measures to facilitate employment.

Seeking employment through the public employment service offers certain advantages. In addition to standard services, people with disabilities are provided with additional guarantees: employment in reserved positions, vocational adaptation, priority referral for training with coverage of living and travel expenses, supported employment, and subsidies for starting one's own business – there are various options. All these services are free of charge.

People with disabilities can earn income, realize their professional potential, feel useful to society, and gain self-confidence.

As of October 1, 2021, the region is home to 57.4 thousand citizens with disabilities, with over 25 thousand individuals aged 18 to the general retirement age. Among them, 14.2 thousand have employment recommendations. Of those with employment recommendations, 6.2 thousand people, or 43.7 percent, are employed.

To encourage the involvement of people with disabilities in labor activities, the region has created conditions for their vocational training, financial support for entrepreneurial activities, adaptation to work, and the establishment of specialized new jobs.

The measures taken allow for an annual increase in the proportion of employed people with disabilities among those seeking employment. More than 50 percent of people with disabilities who apply to the employment service find their desired job.

In January-October 2021, 340 people with disabilities were registered as unemployed. Taking into account those registered as of January 1, 2021, 430 people with disabilities needed employment assistance.

For 10 months of 2021, with the assistance of the employment service, 217 people with disabilities were employed (for the same period in 2020 – 212), including 90 people within the established quota.

For reference.

The proportion of employed people with disabilities among those seeking employment was 50.5 percent, which is 8 percentage points higher than in the same period of 2020 (42.5 percent).

People with disabilities are employed in the manufacturing sector, service sector, social protection sector, education, and others. The main professions for which employment was carried out were: PC operator, facility manager, seamstress, customer service specialist, manager, mechanical assembly fitter, elevator operator, accountant, watchman.

Annually, adaptation to work activities is organized for people with disabilities. In the current year, adaptation to work activities has been organized for 42 people with disabilities in the following professions: work therapy instructor, club leader, computer graphics operator, copying and duplicating machine operator, radio electronic equipment fitter-assembler, secretary, customer service specialist, seamstress, artistic wood product maker, warehouse keeper, supply agent. Essentially, this is an internship: a person with a disability reinforces their skills in practice and learns to interact with other people. A fixed-term employment contract with a person with a disability is concluded for a period of 6 months to a year.

The state fully compensates employers who organize adaptation to work activities for people with disabilities for the costs of paying wages to people with disabilities. They can also count on reimbursement of costs for the purchase of equipment, materials, and workwear.

In 2021, in order to maximize assistance in the employment of unemployed disabled people, including in reserved workplaces, as well as to inform unemployed disabled people with professional and labor recommendations about the measures to promote their employment taken by the labor, employment and social protection authorities of the region, work continued on organizing supported employment for people with disabilities.

More than 1000 unemployed disabled people with labor recommendations were informed in various ways about the employment promotion measures provided by the labor, employment and social protection authorities of the region.

As a result of the work carried out, 374 disabled people expressed their consent to employment assistance, of which 313 subsequently applied to the employment service and registered as unemployed; all were offered supported employment.

If the disabled person agrees, the employment service organizes their individual support:

preliminary interaction with the employer, joint visit to the employer and obtaining preliminary results of the interview,

monitoring the labor activity of disabled people for 3 months after employment.

Providing such assistance to disabled people is effective – it ensures a high percentage of their employment. Thus, in January – October 2021, 38 unemployed disabled people agreed to be accompanied to employers, of whom 34 people were employed as a result of the support, or 89.5 percent of those who agreed.

Every year, new specialized workplaces for disabled people are created in the Vitebsk region. The costs of employers for the purchase of equipment are financed from the budget of the state extra-budgetary fund for social protection of the population of the Republic of Belarus.

In 2021, it is planned to create at least 9 new specialized workplaces for disabled people.