BPS: Unemployment Declines in Q3 of 2018

The Central Statistics Agency (BPS) has reported that of Indonesia’s total labor force reaching 131.01 million people in August 2018, 124.01 million people are employed and 7 million people are still unemployed.

“Compared to the figure a year ago, the working population has increased by 2.99 million people, while unemployment rate has declined by 40 thousand people,” Head of the BPS Suhariyanto said at a press conference at Jakarta, Monday (5/11).

The structure of the working population according to field of jobs in August 2018, according to Suhariyanto, is still dominated by jobs in three sectors namely agriculture, forestry, and fisheries sector (28.79 percent), trade sector (18.61 percent), and processing industry sector (14.72 percent).

Based on employment trend from August 2017 to August 2018, the BPS recorded that the field of businesses saw an increase in the working population percentage on accommodation provider and food and beverage (0.47 percent), processing industry (0.21 percent), and transportation (0.17 percent).

At the same time, some fields reported a decline in the number of workers. They are agriculture (0.89 percent), other services (0.11 percent), and education services (0.05 percent).

According to Suhariyanto, the main employment statuses in August 2018 are mostly laborers/office employees (39.70 percent), self-employment (19.05 percent), temporary/unpaid workers (15.76 percent), working in family business (12.21 percent), and self-employment assisted by permanent workers (3.46 percent).

Furthermore, in August 2017 to August 2018 period, Suhariyanto continued, the working population has increased in self-employment assisted by temporary workers (0.87 percent) and self-employment assisted by permanent workers (0.20 percent).

In the meantime, the decline was reported in freelance workers in agriculture sector, (0.63 percent), freelance workers in non-agriculture sector (0.30 percent), self-employment (0.08 percent), working in family business (0.05 percent), and laborers/office employees (0.01 percent).

The BPS also recorded that in August 2018, 53.52 million people (43.16 percent) were employed in formal sector and 70.49 million people (56.84 percent) were employed in informal sector. “Compared to that in August 2017, the number of informal workers has declined by 0.19 percent,” Suhariyanto said.

Based on the level of education up to August 2018, the workers’ level of education is still dominated by elementary school level or lower (50.46 million people or 40.69 percent), junior high school level (22.43 million people or 18.09 percent), senior high school (22.34 million people or 18.01 percent), and vocational school level (13.68 million people or 11.03 percent).

“There are 15.10 million workers (12.18 percent) with diploma degrees and above,” Suhariyanto said, adding that 11.65 million workers are university-educated. (Humas BPS/ES)

Translated by: Galuh Wicaksono
Edited by: Muhammad Ersan Pamungkas