RIYADH — Saudi Arabia's Human Resources Development Fund (Hadaf) has provided private sector firms with nearly SR511 million in six tranches as part of its "retrospective employment" and "employment support programs". The employment support amount was used for payments of salaries/wages of 53,483 male and female Saudi employees working in over 9,000 establishments, the Saudi Press Agency (SPA) said. The payments included the salaries for the months of January, February and March, retrospectively, for Saudi men and women working in these establishments and for April, May and June, as support for new employments in the labor market. The "employment support program" is part of the initiatives launched by Hadaf to empower the private sector enterprises, ensure their stability, enhance their performance, and mitigate the economic impacts and repercussions of coronavirus. Hadaf emphasized that it is continuing to receive registration requests for private sector establishments so that they can benefit from the "employment support program". Establishments can also benefit from employment support for the last 60 days prior to adding an employee to the social insurance system (GOSI). It is noteworthy that the program supports the wages of male and female citizens in all jobs and professions in all private sector establishments, with a rate ranging from 30 to 50 percent of the employee's monthly salary for two years, provided the salary ranges between SR4,000 and SR15,000. Establishments also receive an additional 10 percent support when hiring females, persons with disabilities, and when hiring in all cities except Riyadh, Jeddah, Dammam and Al-Khobar, and in small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and very small enterprises, provided the maximum support does not exceed 50 percent of the employee's monthly salary, or SR3,000, whichever is less.
