Employment outlook under severe strain

NEW DELHI, INDIA: Financial services, information technology, consumer goods, retail and real estate sectors witnessed the maximum decline in the creation of new jobs because of the economic slowdown, Assocham Research Bureau study said.

The bureau, which tracked job vacancy data in 30 sectors to analyse the creation of new jobs in the economy, found that 'employment outlook of India has come under severe strain'.

'The overall slowdown in the economy has seriously impacted the job creation capacity of certain industrials sectors. Continuation of this trend for a longer term may wash away the benefits generated from the four years of above eight percent growth,' it noted.

The decline in creation of jobs in the previously booming sectors have been between 0.1 to 6.5 percent in both the second and third quarter this calendar year, with information technology and financial services being the worst-hit.

Manufacturing, engineering, construction and aviation have witnessed declining employment trend from the third quarter.

The IT sector accounted for nine percent of new jobs in the first quarter, but this share fell drastically to 2.3 percent in the next quarter from April to June and further declined to 2.09 percent in the third quarter.

'Near about 60 percent revenues of the IT sector comes from US clients and 30 percent revenues were derived from the financial sector which is under severe crisis. This has resulted into grave pressure on the topline as well as bottomline of the IT companies,' said the Assocham study.

Similarly, the financial sector's share dropped from seven to five percent in the second quarter and then falling to two percent in the third quarter.

The real estate sector, which was generating three percent of the new jobs in first quarter, dipped to 1.68 percent in the next quarter and 1.22 percent in the July to September period.

Source: IndiaPRWire