The level of enterprise-surveyed employment in the formal non-agricultural sectors of the economy increased further in the three months to March 2006, albeit at a slower pace than in the three preceding quarters, the South African Reserve Bank (SARB) — quoting from the latest Quarterly Employment Statistics survey by Statistics South Africa — says in its latest quarterly bulletin.
Job losses in a number of sectors caused the overall level of private-sector employment to fall somewhat in the first quarter of 2006, while public-sector employment increased further, the central bank says.
Consistent with the lower interest-rate environment and concomitant high confidence levels in the economy, activity in the construction sector surged, leading to meaningful increases in employment in this sector. Employment in the construction sector increased by 22% in 2005 and by almost 7% in the three months to March 2006.
“The latest business survey of the Bureau for Economic Research [BER] conducted in the building and construction industry confirms that overall building activity continued at a comparatively lively pace in the second quarter of 2006, despite early indications of a moderation in demand in the residential sector.”
Employment in the transport, storage and communication sector expanded significantly during 2005, although some employment losses occurred during the closing months of the year and in the three months to March 2006.
Sturdy increases in the community, social- and personal- services sector also transpired in 2005, although some job losses occurred during recent months. Consistent with the robust increases in consumer demand, employment in the trade, catering and accommodation services sector rose meaningfully in 2005 while also moderating somewhat during the three months to March 2006.
“Due to further retrenchments of employees in the labour-intensive gold-mining sector during the past year, the aggregate level of private-sector employment in 2005 was only marginally higher than in the preceding year.
“Employment numbers in the public sector increased consistently in 2003 and 2004, picking up more decisively in 2005 as national departments, in particular, expanded their employee complements. By contrast, employment in the public-sector transport, storage and communication sector contracted.
“In contrast to the private sector where employment losses occurred, public-sector employment increased by 1,2% in the three months to March 2006, the eighth consecutive quarter of increase,” the SARB said.
It added: “Indications are that labour-market conditions remained conducive to further employment gains in the second quarter of 2006. The volume of job advertisement space in the print media, which has historically been fairly well correlated with formal non-agricultural employment, rose by as much as 32% in the year to the second quarter of 2006.
“At the same time, business confidence according to the Rand Merchant Bank/BER Business Confidence Index declined slightly in the second quarter of 2006 but consistently remained at relatively high levels, unlike those seen in the past thirty years.
“According to the Investec Purchasing Managers Index survey conducted in August 2006, the level of employment in the manufacturing sector is expected to expand further in the near future.”
According to the Wage Settlement Survey by Andrew Levy Employment Publications, the SARB continued, the percentage of companies indicating that they had retrenched workers declined substantially from 37% during the three-year period up to 2003, to only 14,8% during 2005.
“This is a significant reduction and is consistent with other indications of employment growth in the economy. Within this environment of improved job prospects, the number of man-days lost rose from about 700Â 000 in the first half of 2005 to 1,6 million in the first half of 2006, thereby exceeding the first-half totals for the past ten years.
“This increase in the number of man-days lost was due to widespread and prolonged strike action in the transport and security sectors.” — I-Net Bridge