In an encouraging development for the job market, the first quarter of 2023 witnessed a surge in job vacancies, with a notable increase of 5.2 thousand compared to the previous quarter. The total number of job vacancies reached 47.1 thousand, reflecting positive signs of economic growth and expansion.
According to the latest data released by the authorities, the job vacancy rate for the first quarter of 2023 stood at 0.93%, indicating a rise of 0.10 percentage points from the previous quarter. Although a slight decline of 0.2 thousand job vacancies was observed compared to the same quarter in 2022, the job vacancy rate experienced only a marginal decrease of 0.02 percentage points.
The statistics further revealed that certain sectors experienced higher job vacancy rates during the first quarter of 2023. Public administration recorded the highest job vacancy rate of 1.91%, followed by financial and insurance activities (1.88%), water supply, sewerage, waste management, and remediation activities (1.67%), and arts, entertainment, and recreation (1.61%).
Among the economic activities, the manufacturing sector accounted for approximately 23% of the total job vacancies, with 11.0 thousand positions available at a rate of 1.01%. Additionally, the public administration sector had 5.2 thousand job vacancies, the human health and social work activities sector had 4.7 thousand job vacancies, and the education sector had 1.2 thousand job vacancies.
On the other hand, the lowest job vacancy rates were observed in other service activities (0.25%) and education (0.33%). The sectors with the fewest job vacancies included other service activities (0.1 thousand job vacancies), mining and quarrying (0.2 thousand job vacancies), and real estate activities (0.2 thousand job vacancies).
Comparing the first quarter of 2023 with the previous quarter, notable increases in job vacancy rates were observed in real estate activities (+0.89 percentage points) and financial and insurance activities (+0.71 percentage points). The sectors that experienced significant growth in the number of job vacancies were human health and social work activities (+1.6 thousand job vacancies), administrative and support service activities (+1.0 thousand job vacancies), and construction (+0.9 thousand job vacancies).
Conversely, professional, scientific, and technical activities witnessed a decrease of 0.43 percentage points in the job vacancy rate, while transportation and storage experienced a decline of 0.39 percentage points. In terms of the number of job vacancies, transportation and storage saw a reduction of 1.1 thousand positions, and professional, scientific, and technical activities recorded a decrease of 0.7 thousand job vacancies.
Compared to the same quarter in the previous year, real estate activities demonstrated the most significant increase in job vacancy rates (+0.69 percentage points), followed by financial and insurance activities (+0.52 percentage points). The sector with the highest growth in the number of job vacancies was administrative and support service activities (+1.1 thousand job vacancies).
In contrast, the most substantial decreases in both job vacancy rates and the number of job vacancies were observed in information and communication (-0.64 percentage points, -1.2 thousand job vacancies) and transportation and storage (-0.37 percentage points, -1.0 thousand job vacancies).
Analyzing major occupational groups, the first quarter of 2023 displayed the highest job vacancy rates in professionals (major group 2) at 1.16%, followed by clerical