16,880 lost jobs last year

REDUNDANCIES nearly tripled from 3,180 in the third quarter of last year to a record quarterly high of 9,410 workers in the fourth quarter as the global economic downturn worsened.

For the whole of 2008, a total of 16,880 workers were made redundant, comprising 13,920 workers retrenched and 2,970 workers whose contracts were terminated prematurely, according to the latest labour market report released by the Ministry of Manpower on Monday.

More workers across all three broad occupational groups were laid off in the fourth quarter of 2008, with professionals, managers, executives and technicians (PMETs) experiencing the largest increase - from 950 in the third quarter to 3,790 in the fourth quarter. For the whole year, 6,200 PMETs lost their jobs, forming 37 per cent of the workers displaced, up from 31 per cent the previous year.

Correspondingly, the share of production and related workers shed dropped from 56 per cent to 52 per cent, while clerical, sales and service workers fell from 13 per cent to 11 per cent.

During the year, total employment rose by 221,600 or 8.1 per cent, driven largely by strong gains in the first half of the year. But this was lower than the increase of 234,900 or 9.4 per cent in 2007.

Amidst the weakening global economy, employment growth slowed significantly to 21,300 in the fourth quarter of 2008, less than half the gains of 55,700 in the third quarter of 2008 and 62,500 in the fourth quarter of 2007, said MOM.

The slowdown was felt across many industries, led by manufacturing which shed 7,000 workers in the last quarter - its first contraction since the third quarter of 2003. Net job losses occurred mainly in electronic products (-3,400) and transport equipment (-2,700) while petrochemicals & pharmaceutical products still added workers (1,600). For the whole year, manufacturing workforce grew by 19,500, less than half the increase of 49,300 in 2007.

With brisk building activity, the construction workforce grew strongly by a record 64,000 in 2008, up from the gains of 40,400 in 2007. Growth also moderated to 10,700 in the fourth quarter of 2008, compared with average quarterly gains of 17,800 in the preceding three quarters.

Local employment grew by 64,700 or 3.5 per cent in 2008, lower than the increase of 90,400 or 5.2 per cent in 2007.

Due to strong demand for workers earlier in the year, foreign employment grew by 156,900 17 per cent) in 2008, up from 144,500 (19 per cent) in 2007.

As the economic downturn deepened, employment growth slowed significantly for both locals and foreigners in the last quarter of the year. As at December, there were 1,057,700 foreigners forming 36 per cent of the 2.95 million persons employed in Singapore. The majority comprising 64 per cent or 1,894,700 persons in the workforce were locals.

With the economy weakening, the seasonally adjusted overall unemployment rate rose to 2.5 per cent in December, 2.2 per cent in September.

- The Straits Times