Eastern Visayas registers 95.9% employment rate in April 2019

By PSA-8
July 12, 2019

TACLOBAN CITY – Employment rate (ER) in Eastern Visayas in April 2019 was estimated at 95.9 percent, ranking fifth among the regions with high employment rate in the country (Table 1). This figure is higher than the 95.4 percent ER recorded in April 2018. Employment rate is the proportion of employed persons to total labor force.

Out of the estimated 3.2 million population 15 years old and over in April 2019, about 1.9 million were economically active or in the labor force. This number translates to a Labor Force Participation Rate (LFPR) of 61.0 percent. This figure is 2.2 percentage points lower compared with the 63.2 percent LFPR in the same period a year ago. Eastern Visayas registered the eighth lowest LFPR among regions.

The underemployed persons or those employed persons who express the desire to have additional hours of work in their present job or to have additional job, or to have a new job with longer working hours was estimated at 575 thousand in April 2019. This is equal to an underemployment rate of 18.6 percent, lower than the 23.8 percent recorded in the same period last year. The region had the sixth highest underemployment rate in the country.

Meanwhile, about 81 thousand persons in the labor force were unemployed in April 2019. This translates to an unemployment rate of 4.1 percent, lower than the 4.6 percent rate recorded in April 2018. Eastern Visayas ranked fifth among the regions with low employment rate.

Data were based on the preliminary estimates released by the Philippine Statistics Authority from the Labor Force Survey (LFS) conducted in April 2019.