Unemployment rate for Q1 likely to be higher than Q4 2008

Unemployment rate for Q1 likely to be higher than Q4 2008
Channel NewsAsia

SINGAPORE: With the first three months of 2009 just over, Singapore’s Manpower Minister, Gan Kim Yong, said the unemployment rate for the first quarter of this year is likely to be higher than the last three months of 2008.

Speaking to reporters at a community event on Sunday, he said while his ministry is seeing more retrenchment notices being issued, schemes like the Skills Programme for Upgrading and Resilience (SPUR) is helping companies cut costs to save jobs.

Detailed statistics about the job market in the first quarter of this year will be released shortly, said the manpower minister.

But as the economy has yet to recover, the ministry’s immediate focus is the unemployment situation and it will continue pressing on with the various schemes like SPUR and Jobs Credit Scheme to tackle the downturn.

Mr Gan said: "SPUR, Jobs Credit Scheme and the Workfare Income Supplement Scheme — so many programmes have been put in place, and we will continue to work hard with the tripartite partners to help our workers cope with the downturn.

"But we cannot just focus on the downturn. We still have to focus on the longer term fundamental issues, such as re—employment, employment of older workers and women. This is because when the economy recovers, the labour market will tighten again and so we must ensure we have this source of workers to support our economic growth in future."

Mr Gan believes SPUR has been very successful in the last four months. He said it has helped many companies reduce the number of workers who could have ended up being retrenched. With SPUR in place, some companies have decided to defer retrenchment and make a decision later.

But how quickly the Singapore economy recovers depends much on external factors like the global economy’s performance.

Mr Gan said: "We must prepare ourselves for another few quarters of downturn. What is more important now is to focus on managing the downturn and managing costs so that we can save more jobs.

"Sometimes during a downturn, restructuring is inevitable and some retrenchments are unavoidable. If employees are retrenched, we want to reach out to them to help them to upgrade themselves and increase their employability so that they can find jobs faster."

Mr Gan added that there are several sectors in Singapore which have job openings and his message to job seekers is to be flexible and consider sectors they may not have worked in before.

— CNA/yt

- wong chee tat :)