Steady growth in employment since July 2009

Employment levels in the country have seen a steady upward trend for over the past three years despite the adverse effects of the global financial crisis. Twelve quarterly surveys conducted by the labour bureau indicate that the upward trend in employment has been maintained since July 2009, according to the Economic Survey 2011-12.

Surveys covering select sectors such as textiles (including apparel), leather, metals, automobiles, gems and jewellery, transport information technology IT/BPO and handloom/powerloom showed that overall employment in September 2011 increased by 9.11 lakh compared with September 2010.

The highest increase was recorded in IT/BPO with 7.96 lakh additional jobs, followed by metals (1.07 lakh), automobiles (0.71 lakh), gems and jewellery (0.08 lakh) and leather industries (0.07 lakh) during the period.

The upward trend in employment has been continuously observed since July 2009. During the July-September 2011 quarter, employment has increased in respect of all sectors except leather and transport where there was a marginal fall. Overall employment has increased by 3.15 lakh during the quarter.

At the sectoral level, the maximum increase of 2.04 lakh in employment during the June-September 2011 period was in IT/BPO sector, followed by 0.42 lakh in textiles (including apparels), 0.38 lakh in metals, 0.22 lakh in automobiles, 0.09 lakh in handloom/powerloom and 0.07 lakh in gems and jewellery.

In the export oriented units, the employment at the overall level has increased by 1.96 lakh whereas in the non-exporting units, it has increased by 1.16 lakh during the period June-September 2011.