The country’s unemployment rate in July 2023 fell to 4.8 percent from 5.2 percent a year ago as the economy continues to reopen, resulting in more economic activities, the Philippine Statistics Authority said Friday.
National statistician and civil registrar general Dennis Mapa said in an online briefing that the July 2023 jobless rate was, however, higher than the 4.5 percent a month ago partly due to the impact of recent weather disturbances.
“In terms of level, the number of unemployed in July 2023 was estimated at 2.27 million, posting a decline of 329,000 from the 2.60 million reported in July 2022,” Mapa said.
The employment rate in July 2023 was registered at 95.2 percent, higher than the reported rate in July 2022 at 94.8 percent, but lower than the estimate in April 2023 at 95.5 percent.
“Around one million in the agriculture sector did not participate in the labor force. These are in planting and growing of vegetables and tubers… so that subsector’s participation was affected [by the weather disturbances],” Mapa said.
The country’s Labor Force Participation Rate in July 2023 decreased to 60.1 percent from 65.2 percent in July 2022 and 65.1 percent in April 2023. This LFPR translates to 46.90 million who were either employed or unemployed.
Mapa also said that the drop in labor force participation could be attributed to those who shifted to household or family duties.
“We found that 1.99 million focused on household duties. Others said they were too young to work, while others said they could not find a job,” Mapa said.
The number of underemployed persons or employed persons who expressed the desire to have additional hours of work in their present job or to have an additional, or to have a new job with longer hours of work was registered at 7.10 million translating to an underemployment rate of 15.9 percent. This was higher than the reported rate in July 2022 (13.8 percent) and April 2023 (12.9 percent).
On average, employed persons worked 42.3 hours per week, which was higher than the average hours worked in a week in July 2022 at 40.5 hours and in April 2023 at 36.9 hours.
National Economic and Development Authority Secretary Arsenio Balisacan said the entire government remained committed to improving the business climate in the country to attract more investments, which could lead to the creation of high-quality and high-paying jobs.
Balisacan also cited the importance of fast-tracking the implementation of the FY 2023 budget and the government’s infrastructure programs bannered by the ‘Build-Better-More’ infrastructure flagship projects that aim to strengthen the country’s competitiveness and create more job opportunities for workers.
Balisacan expressed the Marcos administration’s priority to roll out programs enhancing the skillsets of Filipino employees. “We will focus on expanding upskilling and retooling programs to improve the country’s labor market performance.
These are critical to assisting members of the workforce, particularly those in vulnerable employment, to improve their employability and allowing them to move across industries and occupations,” he said.
By broad industry group, the services sector consistently dominated the employment hub accounting for 59.4 percent of the total employed persons in July 2023. The agriculture and the industry sectors accounted for 21.5 percent and 19.0 percent, respectively.
The top five sub-sectors with their annual job increases are transportation and storage (337,000); administrative and support service activities (243,000); professional, scientific, and technical activities (162000); information and communication (117,000); and manufacturing (75,000). On the other hand, the top five subsectors that posted the highest decline in the number of employed persons from July 2022 to July 2023 are wholesale and retail trade; repair of motor vehicles and motorcycles (-1.97 million); agriculture and forestry (-1.58 million); public administration and defense; compulsory social security (-271,000); arts, entertainment and recreation (-44,000); and real estate activities (-32,000); For the quarter-on-quarter changes in the number of employed persons in July 2023, the top five subsectors with the largest increase are construction (195,000); professional, scientific, and technical activities (124,000); manufacturing (116,000); fishing and aquaculture (97,000); and information and communication (50,000). Across regions, Region II or Cagayan Valley posted the highest employment rate of 96.7 percent in July 2023.
This was followed by Region XI or Davao Region (96.5 percent) and Region XII or SOCCSKSARGEN (96.4 percent). The unemployment rate at the regional level showed that seven of the 17 regions posted an unemployment rate higher than the national rate of 4.8 percent in July 2023. These were Region V or Bicol Region (6.2 percent), Region IV-A or CALABARZON (5.9 percent), Region VII or Central Visayas (5.5 percent), Region X or Northern Mindanao (5.4 percent), Region VIII or Eastern Visayas (5.1 percent), Region XIII or Caraga (5.1 percent) and National Capital Region (4.9 percent).
