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KUALA LUMPUR: While Malaysia’s labor market has shown signs of improvement, more must be done to accelerate the country’s economic recovery to create more jobs and achieve full employment, said Prime Minister Mustapa Mohamed .
In a statement on Friday (September 11), the economy minister said the unemployment rate fell to 4.7 percent in July, following the reopening of economic sectors in stages since May.
It was an improvement from the record 5.3 percent in May.
Mustapa added that as of June, 28,200 more people were employed, leaving 745,100 unemployed.
“The recovery of the labor market and economic activities is in line with the government’s decision to reopen economic sectors in stages since May. This has allowed more businesses to operate since then, and now almost all economic activities are in operation again. Economic stimulus packages have also helped.
“Although the labor market continues to improve as expected, the government is aware that there are still 745,100 unemployed people, which is higher than the national average of 494,000 for the period from 2016 to 2019,” he said.
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Mr. Mustapa added that an additional 104,300 people were also temporarily unemployed as their jobs were temporarily terminated, but clarified that they were not classified as unemployed as they still had their jobs and would eventually return to work.
However, he explained that most economic sectors currently show an increase in the use of labor since June, especially in the services, transport, information technology and communications sectors.
“The Industrial Production Index, which includes three main sectors that are mining, manufacturing and electronics, experienced a growth of 2.1 percent in July,” he said.
Following an increase in the number of COVID-19 cases, Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin announced the first phase of the Movement Control Order (MCO) that ran from March 18 to March 31.
In April, Mr. Muhyiddin had shared that Malaysia lost RM2.4 billion (US $ 577 million) each day the MCO was enforced. Then, on May 4, the government announced the conditional MCO that allowed almost all economic sectors to operate with strict standard operating procedures.
Malaysia subsequently entered the MCO recovery phase as of June 10 and has been extended to December 31.
Malaysia was forced to enforce the Movement Control Order when COVID-19 cases began to increase in March. (File photo: Bernama)
JOB MARKET NOW SAFE FROM THE WORST OF COVID-19
The executive director of the Socio-Economic Research Center (SERC), Lee Heng Guie, said the country’s labor market appears to have survived the worst of the pandemic.
“Two months of moderation in the unemployment rate, which is 4.7 percent in July and 4.9 percent in June, suggest that the worst of the impact of COVID-19 on the country’s labor markets is behind us. .
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“This improvement is corroborated by the amount of job loss reported in the Employment Insurance System, which has exceeded the peak registered in June of 18,579 people to 16,660 people in July, followed by 9,261 in August and 2,886 on September 9” , said. CNA.
However, he added that while the recovery is occurring steadily, it will be some time before the job market fully recovers.
“It takes some time before the labor market is back near the 3.3 percent pre-pandemic level,” said Mr. Lee.
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