Employment outlook improves

The Philippine central bank said that employment outlook for the coming quarter remains bullish.

In its latest Business Expectation Survey (BES) released on Friday, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) said that the employment outlook index for the next quarter increased to 23 percent.

The central bank said that firms in the services sector were the most optimistic in their employment outlook, consistent with their bullish outlook in second quarter 2013.

“Business sentiment across employment size improves in the quarter ahead. Large-sized firms’ business confidence for both the current and next quarters was the most buoyant, followed by those of medium- and small-sized firms,” the BSP said.

The number of firms with expansion plans is broadly steady, while average capacity utilization declines.

However, in line with the more optimistic business sentiment for the next quarter, firms in the industrial sector continued to have a bullish outlook on the economy.

The percentage of businesses with expansion plans for the next quarter stood at 29.6 percent, relatively steady compared to that of the previous quarter, the BSP noted.

“The average capacity utilization for the current quarter slightly decreased to 73 percent compared to 74.1 percent registered last quarter,” Rosabel Guerrero, director of the BSP-Department of Economic Statistics said.

The First Quarter 2013 BES was conducted during the January 3 to February 8 this year. There were 1,555 firms surveyed nationwide. Respondents were drawn from the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Top 7,000 Corporations. –Raadee S. Sausa Reporter, Manila Times