Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung has approved a plan to support vocational training and job creation for people living with disabilities in the 2012-2020 period.

A vocational training class for children with disabilities at the Hai Duong Social Sponsoring Centre.

Under the plan, working-age residents will receive financial support of up to VND6 million ($300) each to take part in vocational training.

High school students are also included in the plan. After completion of training, students will receive support to find stable jobs.

At least 250,000 people with disabilities will benefit from the project's first period, which extends until 2015.

In HCM City, local authorities and organisations in recent years have worked to offer and improve long- and short-term programmes on vocational training and job promotion for the disabled, particularly women.

The city's Women's Union and Association to Support Disabled People, in co-operation with local banks, is offering preferential loans to the disabled and their families to set up and develop businesses.

About one per cent of the city's population is disabled. Of those, an average of 15,000 people annually are of working age, according to Tran Anh Tuan, deputy director of the city's Centre of Human Resources Forecast and Labour Market Information.

"If local enterprises employed only 2 per cent of the disabled, 6,000 labourers with disabilities would have jobs each year," he said.

To meet the targets, Tuan added that several measures had been mapped out, including improving the capacity of vocational training schools and centres.

Huyen Ngoc Tuyen, senior official of the city's Support Centre for Vocational Training and Job Promotion for Disabled People, said: "Our students have to take a longer time to train, compared to ordinary workers who need three months to study for one course."

Tuyen said her staff faced challenges to help students complete their studies. "We need more support from local authorities to improve our activities," she added.