Strengthening ‘specialized training’ to help E-9 workers adapt to industrial sites

The Ministry of Employment and Labor of Korea has finalized its 2025 budget and announced how much money will be spent on which projects. Government agencies that are run by taxpayers have a duty to provide information on projects and budgets to the public. Looking at the information announced this time, we can see how much budget will be spent on which areas for the employment of foreign residents. Let’s organize this information.

Training skilled workers

Foreigners working in Korea with E-9 visas face various difficulties in Korean industrial sites. The sites themselves are unfamiliar, and they are seeing various machines and tools for the first time and do not know how to use them. Furthermore, since they have to work and live in Korean, it is not easy to adapt. Therefore, the Ministry of Employment and Labor has decided to expand specialized training courses for foreign workers next year.

①E-9 Specialized Training: This program is to educate E-9 workers on basic job skills in cooperation with the regional human resources development center of the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry or local industries. You will be trained on how to use various machines and tools in the manufacturing industry and the basics of your job, and in particular, you will be able to communicate in Korean to some extent in manufacturing sites. Specialized training can be applied for by employers, not foreign workers. It is usually operated as a 4-week course, and we plan to train 6,000 people next year. We also plan to increase the number of specialized training centers for non-professional foreigners and operate them next year.

②Polytechnic Korean language training: Polytechnic universities in Korea originally run vocational training courses. They decided to conduct technical Korean language training by having foreigners participate in this course. As a pilot project, 50 foreigners can participate.

③Support for international students to work and study: It is difficult for international students to do things like company exploration, job training, and visa conversion on their own while attending school. Accordingly, the Ministry of Employment and Labor plans to support a training program for 1,000 international students next year so that they can systematically work and study at the same time.

④ Safety and health education and counseling support: The Ministry of Employment and Labor plans to systemize and expand safety and health education next year so that foreign workers, who suffer from industrial accidents at a higher rate than domestic workers, can work safely. It will also develop more multilingual educational content. It has also decided to strengthen support activities such as counseling for foreigners who are experiencing difficulties in industrial sites.

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