South Korea’s state-owned enterprises are increasingly relying on nonregular workers hired through subcontractors, according to Alio, a state-run statistics website on public companies.

Some 360 state-run agencies hired a total of 62,962 outsourced nonregular workers last year, up about 18.2 percent from 53,280 people in 2009.

The rising trend is damaging to the Park Geun-hye administration’s pledge to reinforce job security and raise the country’s employment rate to 70 percent by the end of her term.

The country’s power distribution company Korea Electric Power Corp. had the highest number of nonregular workers, at 7,717, followed by Incheon International Airport Corp. at 6,130 and Korea Railroad Corp. at 4,971.