The Ministry of Labor's Human Resources Development Fund (Hadaf) has failed to make 200,000 Saudi nationals permanent employees in the private sector, with 75 percent of them leaving their jobs due to “poor management at some companies and excesses in evaluation”. According to sources at Hadaf, over SR1.7 billion had been reserved for them in salary support, which currently stands at a minimum of SR1500 per month. The Ministry of Labor is reportedly considering raising the figure for persons with university qualifications to help private companies retain Saudi staff and provide incentives for stability. The proposed move follows studies showing that 28 percent of those who had left private sector posts were graduates in finance, engineering, health, economy, sales and marketing and computer studies who have found salary support to be insufficient. Tariq Al-Munif of Hadaf's Investment and Financing said that the 2010 budget for appointment and training of job seekers has “no specific limit”. Al-Munif noted that last year that 48,000 Saudis were found positions through Hadaf and that training and appointments agreements were signed with the private sector at a cost of nearly SR2.3 billion. Okaz has learnt, meanwhile, that some Ministry of Labor-approved private recruitment agencies have advertised non-existent jobs to attract clients who they charge an annual fee of, on average, SR450 to join. The agencies were also said to provide training courses, at extra expense to the job-seeker, for the same non-existent positions, with some courses costing as much as SR600.
