Jobs break record pushed up by services, construction, and agriculture
Valor Econômico - 07/18/2008
The hiring of registered workers broke a record in the month of June and in the first half of 2008. According to data of the Ministry of Labor, the month of June had 309,442 job openings, which represents the best result for a month ever. The previous record of the General Registry of Employment and Unemployment (Caged) was from April, 2007 (301,991 openings). In the first half of the year, the supply of formal jobs grew 4.7%, representing an increase of 1,361,388 job positions, the greatest balance registered in the period. In the last 12 months, the accumulated variation reached 6.62% or 1,883,277 new employments, a result that showed to be more favorable than the one from the same period of the previous year - an increase of 5.12%, which means 1,400,391 additional formal jobs. The Minister of Labor, Carlos Lupi, reviewed upward his forecast for the increase in the generation of job openings this year, which had previously been 1.8 million. In the semester, the sector of the economy that most created the jobs was Service, with 438.8 thousand new positions, followed by Transformation Industry, with 317.9 thousand jobs. Agriculture generated 227 thousand jobs and Civil Construction, 197 thousand. Specifically in June the greatest number of new hirings took place in the agricultural sector, 92,580 job positions, which means a record balance of 40% above June 2007's. The coffee plantation in São Paulo and Minas Gerais, and the citriculture in the region of the state of São Paulo were the main responsible for it. Civil Construction had record performance, generating 36,758 jobs in June, 99% superior to the greatest index until then, registered in June, 2007 (18,469 jobs). Commerce also showed dynamism, as it was responsible for the generation of 48,213 jobs, the best performance for the period of the Caged series, a balance 71% above the one from the same period of the previous year (28,162 jobs) and 50% greater compared to the last record from June 2005 (32,123 jobs). Industry, on its turn, generated 52,214 jobs in June, also the best index of the Caged series. On a regional comparison, there was an increase in the number of jobs in almost all the states in the first six months of the year. Exceptions are: Paraíba (- 6,042 jobs), Pernambuco (- 4,430) and Alagoas (- 39,980). The positive prominence was for São Paulo (577.745) and Minas Gerais (218,490). In total, the number of registered workers increased from 28.9 million, in the end of 2007, to 30.3 million, in June. The main sectors were: Services (11.8 million), Transformation Industry (7.3 million) and Commerce (6.6 million).