KUALA LUMPUR, July 20 — Human Resources Minister Datuk M. Saravanan told Parliament today that the economic measures initiated by the Perikatan Nasional (PN) government are starting to bear fruit in the labour market.
Citing data from the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM), Saravanan said that 12.7 million people or 83.5 per cent have started working again as at June 2 compared to 10.2 million or 67.2 per cent at May 7 during the recovery movement control period (RMCO) imposed by the government to curb the spread of the Covid-19 coronavirus.
“The labour market is expected to continue to strengthen in the medium term until the second half of 2020,” he said during Question Time.
He noted that the unemployment rate in May was projected to increase to 5.5 per cent.
Saravanan was responding to Opposition Leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim who wanted to know the projected national unemployment rate and estimates of this demographic group until year end as well as the Human Resources Ministry’s steps to overcome a surge in joblessness.
Saravanan said DOSM data estimates Malaysia’s unemployment rate at between 3.5 per cent and 5.5 per cent, adding that the hardest hit sectors are tourism, manufacturing and services.
He said others impacted are the self-employed who are mostly traders and small entrepreneurs.
“The Economic Concern Package for People (Prihatin) and Additional Prihatin for Small and Medium Enterprises Economic Stimulus Package have successfully saved more than 2.4 million jobs, reduced the cash flow burden of almost 11 million people and provided support to more than 300,000 companies.
“Through the National Economic Regeneration Plan (Generator), my ministry is involved in the implementation of five initiatives out of 11 initiatives to empower the people through the Social Security Organisation (Socso) and Pembangunan Sumber Manusia Berhad (PSMB),” Saravanan added.
