ILO expects India to face global slowdown better than most countries

The International Labour Organisation (ILO) believes India would be able to face the latest global slowdown better than most countries, provided it ensured that income levels rose for the working class and a growing working-age population had enough jobs.

The annual report on global employment by the ILO says, "The main challenge is not unemployment, but rather the high degree of informality that persists despite strong growth."

"The robust growth witnessed in the South Asian region was driven largely by India and was mainly due to the rapid rise in labour productivity, rather than an expansion in employment," according to the report, titled, 'Global Employment Trends 2012: Preventing a Deeper Jobs Crisis'.

India accounts for 74 per cent of the South Asia region's labour force.

In India, total employment was up only 0.1 per cent over the five years to 2009-10 -- from 457.9 million in 2004-05 to 458.4 million in 2009/10. In the period labour productivity, which is the amount of goods and services that a worker produces in a given amount of time,  grew by over 34 per cent.

A major reason for the slow growth in employment in recent years was the drop in women participation in the labour force, which had been most pronounced in India, where participation of women in labour activities declined from 49.4 per cent in 2004-05 to 37.8 per cent in 2009-10 for rural females. It was down from 24.4 per cent to 19.4 per cent for urban females.