Jobs pick up in Asia, but things are still tough: ILO

Jobs in Asia; The labour markets of Asia-Pacific have partially recovered from the impact of covid-19, but the full recovery

ByGround Report Desk29 Nov 2022

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The labour markets of Asia-Pacific have partially recovered from the impact of covid-19, but the full recovery of the region remains difficult and will be so in 2023, according to a report released this Monday the 28th by the International Labor Organization (ILO).

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labour market

“While employment trends in Asia-Pacific appear positive, the region's labour market has yet to return to its pre-crisis course, with numerous additional challenges clouding future growth prospects,” said ILO economist Sara Elder, lead author of the report.

Employment in the vast region is already two per cent above the level prior to the 2019 crisis, recovering from the loss of more than 57 million jobs in 2020, according to the report " Social and Employment Outlook in A sia and the Pacific 2022 ”.

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However, the recovery is not complete, and the region still lacks 22 million jobs in 2022, representing a 1.1% employment gap compared to what it would have been without the pandemic.

This number is projected to rise to 26 million (1.4%) by 2023, given the headwinds to growth in the current global and regional geopolitical context.

Total hours of work in the region

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According to the Asian Development Bank, the world's main advanced economies will grow 1.9% in 2022 and only one per cent in 2023, while the region's developing economies as a whole will grow 4.3% this year and 4. 9% in 2023.

The lower growth in Asia compared to forecasts at the beginning of the year is attributed first of all to lower expectations for China, which according to the regional bank will grow 3.3% this year and 4.5% in 2023.

In the field of employment, the ILO recorded that the total hours of work in the region remained below those of 2019, and the regional unemployment rate in 2022 was 5.2%, an increase of 0.5 points percentages compared to 2019.

By 2022, all subregions had recovered the job losses of 2020 and were showing positive job growth over 2019.

However, job growth did not keep pace with population growth. Only in the Pacific was the employment-population ratio in 2022 higher than in 2019. The report highlights which sectors are growing as sources of employment, which are declining and which are home to 'decent work opportunities.

Important sectors in terms of employment

Although the information technology services sector is the fastest growing in the region in terms of employment growth, only 9.4 million people worked in the sector in 2021, which corresponds to barely 0.5% of the total. full employment.

By contrast, the three most important sectors in terms of employment in Asia-Pacific: agriculture, forestry and fisheries; manufacturing industry; and wholesale and retail trade, together represented 1.1 billion workers in 2021 or 60% of the 1.9 billion workers in the region.

The sectors in which workers are concentrated are often characterized by limited labour productivity, low wages, poor working conditions, and low job and income security.

The majority of workers in these sectors lack social protection, and there is also a high degree of informality so the gains made in recent decades have been largely reversed by the pandemic.

Gender inequality remains very large, with almost all high-growth employment sectors benefiting men to the detriment of women.

Only hotel and restaurant activities are spared from this trend since 55% of the jobs added between 1991 and 2021 are for women.

“While information technology and modern sectors receive most of the attention, the greatest potential to drive growth and decent work in the region lies in much less glamorous areas,” said Elder.

He added that "the challenge going forward is to increase and sustain policy attention and public investment to achieve decent work and inclusion in all sectors, especially those where the majority of people work."