(Yicai Global) Feb. 13 -- New energy vehicle maker BYD and other Chinese manufacturers are actively hiring as China’s economy recovers from the Covid-19 pandemic.

BYD started signing up new workers for its plant in Zhengzhou, central Henan province, that is still under construction, before the end of the week-long Spring Festival holiday on Jan. 27, Yicai Global has learned.

As a lot of migrant workers were due to return home from the metropolises along the eastern coast to Henan province over the holiday, BYD decided to seize the opportunity to carry out large-scale recruitment in preparation for when the factory opens later this year, an employee in the Shenzhen-based firm's human resources department said.

Next to BYD’s recruitment center, a number of logistics firms and engineering technology companies have also set up tents to ply the crowd attracted by the carmaker.

Labor demand is showing a significant upward trend now that the industrial and supply chains are entering a critical recovery period, Xu Hongcai, deputy director of the Economic Policy Committee of the China Association of Policy Science, told Yicai Global.

An auto parts manufacturer is hiring more front-line workers and research and development staff as orders so far this year have already surpassed that of last year, an executive told Yicai Global. Based in eastern Zhejiang province, the company supplies components to big Chinese and foreign carmakers such as BYD, General Motors and Ford.

And Baorunda New Materials is planning a new round of recruitment as the polyurethane materials supplier is expecting revenue to jump more than 30 percent this year on strong demand, General Manager Zhu Zhengye said. The Henan-based company already has more than CNY200 million (USD29 million) worth of orders for this year.

The number of job positions advertised in the hotel and catering industry soared 40 percent last week from the week before, according to recruitment platform Zhaopin’s latest weekly report on the job market. While the number of jobs on offer for car and truck drivers as well as air and train crew members surged 82.5 percent, those in the tourism sector jumped 58.9 percent and those for general workers and technicians advanced 42.2 percent.

Over 71 percent of companies are optimistic about the economy and long-term economic development, according to a survey conducted by Zhaopin.

Editors: Tang Shihua, Kim Taylor