More Pinoys jobless despite high economic growth

By Kim Arveen Patria | Yahoo! Southeast Asia Newsroom – Tue, Jun 11, 2013

Reuters/REUTERS - A building occupied by Teleperformance, a call center company, is seen next to other newly constructed buildings in Manila's Makati financial district May 3, 2013. Standard & Poor's raised the Philippines' credit rating to investment grade on Thursday, the second debt agency to do so in less than two months, putting the Southeast Asian country on track to attract more foreign capital flows which are challenging policymakers. REUTERS/Erik De Castro (PHILIPPINES - Tags: BUSINESS)  less

The Philippines may be on a roll in terms of economic growth, but its performance is not as stellar when it comes to jobs for its workers.

 

The ratio of unemployed Filipinos spiked to 7.5 percent in April from 6.9 percent a year ago, official government data showed.

 

Some 3.1 million of the 64 million Filipinos aged 15 up are unemployed, the National Statistics Office (NSO) reported on Tuesday.

 

This is higher than the 2.8 million jobless working-age Filipinos the government recorded a year earlier.

 

Dismal employment figures came weeks after the Philippines reported that its economy grew by 7.8 percent in the first quarter, outpacing most of its neighbors.

 

“The drop in the employment rate is due to the decline in employment in the agriculture sector,” NSO said in its website.

 

The number of workers in the agriculture sector fell to 11.84 million in April from 12.47 million a year ago, which means that around 620,000 jobs were lost in the sector.

 

“While employment in the agriculture sector had dropped, employment in the industry sector and services sector grew,” NSO said.

 

The services sector remained the biggest employer, providing jobs for 53 percent of the total employed. The agriculture sector had a 31 percent share and the industry sector, 16 percent.

 

The latest employment figures highlights the importance of sound policies to improve agriculture and education, the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) said.

 

“[G]reater diversification of agricultural production and further processing of by-products should be encouraged” to address the “seasonality of agricultural employment,” NEDA Deputy Director-General Emmanuel Esguerra said.

 

To mitigate the impact of natural disasters on jobs, “it is also imperative for government to design a more effective disaster response system,” he added.

 

The NEDA official also urged ramped up partnerships among the private sector, academe and government to solve the problem of jobs-skills mismatch.

 

“There is a need to improve the employability of worker applicants, particularly those with secondary and tertiary education,” Esguerra said.