Unemployment Rate Falls Year-over-Year

• Data from the April 2021 labour market survey indicates that more than half of the 151,100 persons who lost their jobs in July 2020, during the initial stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, have been reinstated according to Planning Institute of Jamaica (PIOJ) Director General, Dr. Wayne Henry.
• The unemployment rate for April 2021 was 9.0% compared with a rate of 7.8% in April 2019. This figure amounts to about 84,400 persons. No survey was undertaken in 2020 due to COVID-19 as such the unemployment rate for April 2020 is unavailable. Notably, a decline in the labour force by 40,500 persons to 1,206,000 in April, relative to the same period in 2019 contributed to the improvement in the unemployment rate. When compared with January 2020 when Jamaica recorded its pre-COVID-19 employment high, employment levels have improved and have been doing so since July 2020, as the economy gradually reopened and restrictions were relaxed.
• The PIOJ expects pre-COVID-19 employment levels should be attained in the fiscal year 2022/23. This will be influenced by continued recovery in the tourism sector, and higher private consumption, which will drive the demand for goods and services and the need for labour to facilitate their production. Notwithstanding, the spread of the delta variant of the coronavirus has resulted in tightened restrictive measures including earlier curfews and no movement days. This may force employers to cut staff hours or even lay off some workers and cause a rise in the unemployment rate.

(Source: JIS News & NCBCM Research)