Malaysia’s labour market saw an increase of 3.2% in jobs, or 267,000 more jobs, in the second quarter of 2022 (2Q22) to record 8.619 million during the period, from 8.352 million a year ago.

The Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM), in its Quarterly Employment Survey released on Wednesday (Aug 10), said the number of filled jobs in 2Q22 was 8.427 million, with the rate of filled jobs being 97.8%.

It said the number of job vacancies stood at 191,000, from 178,000 in 2Q21, with a rate of 2.2%, while the number of jobs created edged up to 29,400 from 16,180.

The DOSM said more than half of the jobs and filled jobs in 2Q22 were in the services sector with 4.476 million, while the manufacturing sector recorded 2.358 million jobs and 2.251 million filled jobs.

It said the manufacturing sector posted the largest share of job vacancies at 55.9%, followed by agriculture (16.1%), the services sector (16%), construction (11.8%), and mining and quarrying (0.2%).

The DOSM said the highest number of jobs was created in the services sector — 52.5% or 15,400 jobs — followed by the manufacturing sector, with a contribution of 30.6% or 9,000 jobs, and construction at 11.8% or 3,400 jobs.

In terms of share across skills categories, the department said jobs in the semi-skilled category recorded the highest share of 62.2%, followed by the skilled category at 24.9%, while 12.9% were in the low-skilled category.

During the quarter, the number of filled jobs in the skilled category stood at 2.094 million, an increase of 72,000 jobs, compared with 2.022 million in 2Q21.

• The Edge Markets