THE government is looking to sustain the decline in the number of unemployed workers by further relaxing quarantine restrictions in Metro Manila and other parts of the country.
On Tuesday, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) in its latest Labor Force Survey (LFS) reported that the number of unemployed workers in the country in July dropped to 3 million compared to the same period last year.
Relaxed restrictions
The trend coincided with the government decision to ease quarantine restrictions during that period, Malacañang pointed out.
“This happened when quarantine restrictions were removed,” Presidential spokesman Harry Roque said in a virtual briefing.
Roque said they hope to continue the trend once the government starts institutionalizing granular or localized lockdowns to replace the existing community quarantine classification.
“This change in strategy to localize [the lockdowns] is part of our strategy to keep the economy open to minimize the number of people who are hungry,” Roque said.
As of press time on Tuesday, Roque said the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF) is still ironing out the guidelines for the institutionalized granular lockdowns.
Missing workers
Despite the recent improvements in the latest LFS, the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) expressed concern over the implication of the latest LFS.
It noted that the lower unemployment rate could also be attributed to the large number of workers who chose not to look for a job during the pandemic.
“There is a decrease in the number of employed persons [-3.408 million] and unemployed [-691,000] which can be attributed to the lower labor force participation rate at 59.8 percent,” DOLE said in a statement.
Furthermore, DOLE also said that improvement is unlikely to be reflected in the August data, when the National Capital Region (NCR) was placed under a two-week lockdown.
The imposition of Enhanced Community Quarantine (ECQ), and Modified Enhanced Community Quarantine (MECQ) in NCR and other provinces and cities will surely affect the future LFS rounds.
But like Malacañang, the DOLE is hopeful of improvements in the country’s work force in the coming months, with the ramped-up vaccination initiatives and measures to ease quarantine restrictions.
It added that implementation of its National Employment Recovery Strategy (NERS) will help businesses and workers recover from pandemic-induced disruptions by providing them incentives, job facilitation services and upskilling and retooling initiatives.