KUALA LUMPUR, March 29 — Job recruitment for Malaysian companies on the Internet continued to drop across all industries last month, as low crude oil prices and a slowdown in trade with top partner China continue to bite.
Global online employment firm Monster said its year-over year study of job postings on the Internet showed a 39 per cent drop for all occupations.
“The declining oil prices and sluggish growth of the Chinese economy continue to have an adverse impact on Malaysia’s economic growth, as well as hiring sentiments across the board.
“To cope with challenging market conditions, some employers have continued to slow down their hiring activities, while others have taken a further step in cutting down on their workforce,” Sanjay Modi, managing director for Monster’s India, Middle East, Southeast Asia and Hong Kong markets said in a statement accompanying the survey results.
Malaysia’s logistics, freight and shipping sector was the hardest hit. Its decline was at 56 per cent in comparison to 33 per cent earlier this year.
But Sanjay also said the recent flow of foreign investment in local businesses may help to improve the job markets here.
“Recently, there have been growing interests from foreign businesses to invest in domestic businesses due to the greater cost effectiveness within the country. A steady flow of such investments into the country can be favourable to the local job markets,” he said in the statement.
The firm index also pointed out that occupations, jobs in software, hardware and telecoms saw the greatest decline at 73 per cent.
The employment slowdown contradicts the economic performance registered by the country as a whole last quarter, with gross domestic product (GDP) growth coming in a 4.5 per cent in the last months of 2015.
The GDP growth exceeded forecasts and has prompted economists and ratings firms to predict a gradual recovery for Malaysia towards the end of 2016.
Monster Worldwide describes itself as a global online employment solution provider with a presence in North America, Europe, and Asia.
It launched its Monster Employment Index in 2015, which it said is based on “a real-time review of millions of employer job opportunities”.
