The financial crisis has left many without jobs all over the world. But here in China, there are a few encouraging signs. A recent report says China exceeded its 2009 employment target well before the end of the year.

State media has announced some 9 point 4 million jobs were created in China during the first ten months of this year. That surpassed the government's goal of nine million for the entire year.

The unemployment rate rose from slightly to 4.3 percent in the first quarter of this year due to the financial crisis. And a drop in export sales forced many factories to slash production or close their businesses, leaving about 23 million migrant workers without jobs.

Well from the financial aspects of China's newly announced growth figures to an unexpected literary by-product.

One of the key factors to this phenomenal economic success is the country's army of migrant workers. These are the source of the cheap labor that fuels China's manufacturing and service industries.

And as BON's Tom Mackenzie reports this often looked-down-upon sector of society has now produced a best-selling novel.

When you think of museums, words like ancient, priceless, rare or exquisite come to mind. But in the northeastern suburbs of Beijing, there's a museum which seems a world away from those concepts. And it details the often-ignored parallel history between a special group of migrant workers and the development of China.

These are various temporary residence permits from different cities through the years. They used to be like lucky charms for millions of migrant workers, because if you were unfortunate enough to come across the local police without it, you would likely be fined, arrested or sent home.

But this was never to happen again after Sun Zhigang, a college-educated migrant worker, was beaten to death in police custody after being detained for not carrying a permit in 2003.

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Last Thursday in Zhengzhou city, Henan province, a red Mazda 6 was initially witnessed to be driving slowly through an open ground where many migrant workers usually rest at about 10pm with both headlights switched off. The driver suddenly turned on the lights and accelerated toward some migrant workers resting on the ground. Several people were hit including Liu Hui, who was run over by the car and suffered chest injuries.

The issue of migrant workers is a pisive one in China's capital.  Most Beijingers are well aware of the need for workers from the countryside to do the jobs that they are not willing to do. 

Migrant workers are the force behind Beijing's rapid development over the last couple of decades.  Nowhere was that more evident than in the run-up to the Olympics, when sporting venues and transport facilities sprang up at astonishing speed. 

On the flip side, there is still widespread prejudiced against migrant workers.  Many Beijing residents often see them as rude and uneducated, and perceive them as second class citizens.

That issue was brought to the fore once again by a new government policy aimed at giving the children of migrant workers access to compulsory education at public schools in Beijing. While the aim of the move is to give equal education opportunities to all, some in Beijing question whether it's practical to introduce a further burden into the city's already strained education system. 

China's economic miracle has been in large part powered by the more than 200 million migrants who have left their homes in the countryside to work in the country's burgeoning towns and cities. But though the money they earn is often far greater than what they would get through farming, life is rarely easy. A group of volunteers in one central Chinese province is now trying to change that.

China's army of migrant workers often go almost unnoticed as they help to construct China's cities and towns. But here in the central province of Anhui, volunteers have launched a program to spend time with some of those who have swapped life in the countryside for life as a migrant worker. They listen to their concerns, ask them to fill out psychological surveys and offer them help.

Here at a construction site in Hefei, the provincial capital, a group of volunteers who go by the name "Soul Volunteers" talked for hours with a number of farmers-turned workers.

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