PUTRAJAYA, May 20 — Malaysia’s labour market momentum escalated in the first quarter of 2022 (Q1 2022) as both demand and supply ascended further, according to the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM).

Commenting on the release of the Labour Market Review, First Quarter 2022 (LMR Q1 2022) today, Chief Statistician Datuk Seri Mohd Uzir Mahidin said since the beginning of this year, the government had continued to lift the Covid-19 containment measures implemented for the past two years as all the states had shifted into the final phase of National Recovery Plan (NRP).

“More people proceed to conduct business and social activities while ensuring compliance to the standard operating procedures, thus prompting a rise in people’s mobility within and across the states.

“The flurries of socioeconomic activities continued throughout the quarter as things had practically resumed some semblance of normalcy. Therefore, the economy expanded by 5.0 per cent in the first quarter of 2022 after posting a growth of 3.6 per cent in the previous quarter,” he said in a statement.

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From the perspective of labour supply in the first quarter of 2022, Mohd Uzir said the number of employed persons edged up by 2.2 per cent to register 15.57 million persons as against the same quarter of preceding year which recorded 15.24 million persons.

On the other hand, the number of unemployed persons reduced further by 13.0 per cent to 671,200 persons (Q1 2021: 771,800) while the unemployment rate stood at 4.1 per cent after declining by 0.7 percentage point (Q1 2021: 4.8 per cent).

A larger magnitude of employment growth than the decrease in unemployment led the number of labour force to ascend by 1.5 per cent to 16.25 million persons in this quarter.

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Thus, the labour force participation rate (LFPR) improved 0.4 percentage point to 69.0 per cent (Q1 2021: 68.6 per cent).

“Although this was the highest LFPR registered since first quarter of 2020, the rate was slightly lower by 0.1 percentage point (than that) recorded in the fourth quarter of 2019 which was the quarter before the Covid-19 outbreak,” he said.

Given that the whole country was in the final phase of the NRP from January 2022, he said Malaysia’s labour market in the first quarter of 2022 improved considerably as compared to the same quarter in 2021.

“The labour market also indicated a better situation compared to the preceding quarter albeit at a slower pace.

“As social and economic activities continue to normalise throughout the second quarter of 2022, it is expected to stimulate the labour market situation in terms of increasing demand by the industry and continuous decline in the number of unemployed,” he added. — Bernama