Govt falls short of job creation targets–NEDA

The Arroyo administration has failed to meet its annual job creation targets for the past five years, according to a report of the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA).

And also from 2004 to 2008, the report said, employment growth lagged behind economic growth.

In its updated Medium Term Philippine Development Plan (MTPDP) for 2010, the authority warned that unemployment “remains high and meeting job creation targets continues to be a challenge.”

Using the new International Labor Organization-based methodology, the agency said that the joblessness rate stood at 8 percent in 2006, 7.3 percent in 2007 and 7.4 percent in 2008.

At end-July, the country’s unemployment rate was 7.6 percent or a total of 2.9 million Filipinos were without jobs.

“The estimated 3.5 million employment generated in the 2004 to 2008 period represents a backlog of about 3.5 million, given a target of at least 1.4 million employment created per year,” the report said.

Moreover, according to the report, employment creation in 2008 suffered because of a slowing economy, generating only 530,000 new jobs.

‘Major concern’

The agency said that employment growth lagged behind economic growth, and it remains a “major concern.”

From 2005 to 2008, it added, the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) grew at an annual average rate of 5.5 percent, much higher than the average employment growth rate of only 2.2 percent.

An indicator of economic performance, GDP is the amount of final goods and services produced in a country in a year.

Last year, the economy grew by 4.6 percent, but employment growth rate was only 1.6 percent.

With weak employment creation, higher prices and population increases in 2004 to 2006, the number of poor families in the Philippines rose by 2.5 percentage points to 26.9 percent in 2006 from 24.4 percent in 2003.

In terms of population, the number of poor Filipinos jumped from 23.8 million in 2003 to 27.6 million in 2006.

Overseas employment

The NEDA’s medium-term plan said that overseas employment remained a vital source of jobs for many Filipinos as deployment figures continued to rise, particularly for highly skilled workers.

Currently, overseas employment continues to fuel the domestic economy, with remittances from overseas Filipino amounting to $62.9 billion from 2004 to 2008.

Remittances in 2008 posted a significant increase of 13.7 percent from 2007, buoying the economy amid the global economic turmoil.

Data from Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas showed that money sent home by overseas Filipino workers went up by 8.6 percent year-on-year to $1.446 billion in September.

This increase caused remittances, which contribute 10 percent to the country’s GDP, to grow by 4.2 percent year-on-year to $12.8 billion in the first nine months.

According to Philippine Overseas Employment Administration data, total job orders processed reached 226,260 at end-October, representing 43.9 percent of the 515,438 jobs needed.

About 80 percent of the job orders processed were for service, production and transport-related workers. –DARWIN G. AMOJELAR SENIOR REPORTER, Manila Times