JK creates 1m formal jobs in 10 years

 

By Veneranda Sumilla The Citizen Reporter

In Summary

Official figures released by the National Bureau of Statistics indicate that the economy created only 282,382 formal jobs in 2014 after the country’s economic growth slowed down to 7 per cent from 7.3 per cent a year before

“I can argue that the pace of creating formal jobs in the country is very discouraging. I am wondering to see only 1 million jobs being created in the past nine years,”
MR HUSSEIN KAMOTE, CTI POLICY AND ADVOCACY DIRECTOR     

Dar es Salaam. The Tanzania economy created fewer formal jobs last year compared to the year before, worsening the country’s labour market that came under additional pressure from the more than 400,000 graduates who left colleges.

Official figures released by the National Bureau of Statistics indicate that the economy created only 282,382 formal jobs in 2014 after the country’s economic growth slowed down to 7 per cent from 7.3 per cent a year before.

Fewer job creation last year has taken the Kikwete government farther off the 500,000 jobs it promised to be creating each year upon coming to power in 2005.

In the preceding year, the economy created 308,951 jobs, meaning last year’s performance was 8.6 per cent less than the year 2013.

However, the new figures reveal that in the past nine years to 2014, the country generated 1,117,011 formal jobs. This added to the 1,024,340 formal jobs that were in place by 2005 when President Jakaya Kikwete took power.

“I can argue that the pace of creating formal jobs in the country is very discouraging. I am wondering to see only 1 million jobs being created in the past nine years,” Confederation of Tanzania Industries director of policy and advocacy, Hussein Kamote said.

According to Mr Kamote, with the country having a population of about 50 million people “it is a shame for the economy to create such few formal jobs.”

The decrease in the new formal sector jobs is acting like a burden to few formal employees – with their salaries remaining almost stagnant – who are forced to continue supporting a large number of dependants some of who have finished college but cannot find jobs.

The pain of mass unemployment is even worse at this time when the local currency is depreciating at the highest speed which is set to pile pressure on households who fear that prices of different goods and services will go up significantly.

“The reason for such little formal new jobs creation is that the government has neglected the sectors that can generate a significant number of jobs,” said Mr Kamote.

He mentioned sectors like agriculture and manufacturing as among sectors that contribute the biggest number of jobs but the government has put less emphasis to ensure the sectors prosper.

“The manufacturing sector for example is characterised by very many challenges, it is very difficult for one to start a new business here, even the existing ones are burdened by taxes which they have to pay to the government, thus forcing them to keep a very few number of employees so as to obtain profit,” said Mr Kamote.