Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III expressed hope Friday that the incoming Marcos administration would be able to sustain gains of the Duterte government, citing the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) report that the country’s employment rate improved as it continues to overcome the COVID-19 pandemic.
“As we transition to the incoming administration, we will strive to maintain stability and industrial peace in the labor market until the last day of our work. We are confident that the incoming administration will be able to sustain the gains that we had, and even surpass them,” Bello said in a statement.
“We will be leaving with a far better labor market condition,” he added.
“We are ending our term in office this month on a happy note. We are turning over a labor market that is in a far better condition than what we previously had because of the pandemic, as shown in the April 2022 Labor Force Survey,” the Labor chief added.
“While the worst may seem to be over, the challenges ahead are still enormous. Despite the lingering pandemic being put under control, external shocks triggering rising prices of fuel, food and other basic commodities adversely impact our economy and threaten our continued efforts to improve the labor market,” he said.
Citing the latest report of the PSA, Bello said there was a significant increase of 5.3% or 2.450 million in the economically active workforce compared to the January 2022 round.
The April 2022 LFS also recorded the highest employment rate since the pandemic at 94.3% or 45.631 million employed workers, translating to employment gains of 2.613 million vis-à-vis the January 2022 round (43.018M or 93.6%).
The unemployment rate decreased as well to 5.7% or 2.762 million unemployed in April 2022 compared to 6.4% or 2.925M unemployed persons in January 2022.
Also, a decline in the underemployment rate was observed at 14% or 6.399 million in April 2022, compared to 14.9% or 6.397 million underemployed persons in January 2022.
Bello said the department will continue to monitor the development and is ready to act to help workers through emergency employment, livelihood grants, and employment facilitation services, among others.