More than 1,100 inmates signed preliminary employment agreements with 65 companies at a job fair held at a jail in Changsha, capital of central China's Hunan Province Tuesday.

The job fair, first of its kind held in the province, is designed to "help the to-be-released prisoners return to society," said Liu Wanqing, director of Hunan Prison Administrative Bureau.

Xiao Tang, 21, who will be released in a few days, signed a job agreement with a clothing manufacturer in southern Guangdong Province.

"I have stayed here for such a long time that I do not know what employers need," said the young woman, "A job fair like this really helps me a lot."

Many people, however, still have bias against people newly released from prison, who thus have to conceal their history when applying for jobs, said Liu.

"The job fair serves as a platform for employers and prisoners to know more about each other, which helps them to find what they need. More importantly, the prisoners can feel the respect and care from society," said Liu.

"The latter is more important to the prisoners," he said.

The Rongtai Restaurant in Changsha hired 25 waitresses and four security guards at Tuesday's fair. "Our restaurant promised to give equal treatment to all our employees, whether or not they had been in jail," said Miss Zhou, head of human resources department of the restaurant.

All the 28 jails in Hunan have run vocational training programs for prisoners in recent years and more than 7,000 inmates have received trainings since the province established the first jail focusing on vocational training in their rehabilitation programs in 2002, said Liu.

"Practices show that to help released prisoners find a job has effectively prevented them from committing crimes again," he said.

About 10,000 prisoners were released from jails each year in Hunan. Among the 7,000 released prisoners who have received vocational training, only four have committed crimes again, he said.

Hunan Prison Administrative Bureau has also set up a website to provide job information to prisoners and it plans to run one or two job fairs for prisoners a year, said Liu.

(Xinhua News Agency July 20, 2005)