The Shanghai's labor and social security department revealed on July 19th that in the first half of this year, the trend of foreigners heading to Shanghai for work continued to gather strength, with newly obtained work permits growing 32.1 percent over the same period last year, totaling 9,071. At present, the number of foreigners working in Shanghai has reached 41,290.

In the first half of this year, newly processed work permits were obtained by foreigners from 95 countries, 12 more countries than last year's total of 83. Countries with the most applicants are Japan, U.S., South Korea, Singapore and Germany, presently accounting for 63.3 percent of all foreigners working in China.

It was learned that amongst foreigners coming to work in Shanghai, senior managers total 2204, or 24.3 percent; ordinary managers total 3886, or 42.8 percent; senior technical staff total 655, or 7.2 percent; technical staff total 1204, or 13.3 percent; permanent chief representative of foreign enterprises 389, 4.3 percent, representatives 656, 7.2 percent.

(Chinanews.cn July 20, 2005)