PUTRAJAYA: Malaysia’s labour market momentum increased in the first quarter of 2022 as both demand and supply ascended further, according to the Department of Statistics Malaysia.
The number of people employed has gone up while at the same time, that of the unemployed has reduced.
Commenting on the release of the Labour Market Review, First Quarter 2022 (LMR Q1 2022) yesterday, chief statistician Datuk Seri Dr Mohd Uzir Mahidin said since the beginning of this year, the government had continued to lift the Covid-19 restrictions.
“The flurry of socioeconomic activities continued throughout the quarter as things had resumed with some semblance of normalcy.
“The economy expanded by 5% in the first quarter of 2022 after posting a growth of 3.6% in the previous quarter,” he said.
From the perspective of labour supply in the first quarter of 2022, Mohd Uzir said the number of employed persons edged up by 2.2% to register 15.57 million persons against the same quarter of the preceding year which recorded 15.24 million persons.
On the other hand, the number of unemployed persons reduced further by 13% to 671,200 persons (Q1 2021: 771,800) while the unemployment rate stood at 4.1% after declining by 0.7 percentage point (Q1 2021: 4.8%).
A larger magnitude of employment growth than the decrease in unemployment led the number of labour force to ascend by 1.5% to 16.25 million persons in this quarter.
Therefore, the labour force participation rate improved 0.4 percentage point to 69% (Q1 2021: 68.6%).
“The labour market also indicated a better situation compared to the preceding quarter albeit at a slower pace.
“As social and economic activities continue to normalise throughout the second quarter of 2022, it is expected to stimulate the labour market situation in terms of increased demand by the industry and a continuous decline in the number of unemployed,” he added. — Bernama