The environment also saw companies lay off workers, especially in the banking sector, where there was a decelerated growth of 3.7 percent in the financial and insurance activities/FILE
NAIROBI, Kenya, Apr 20 – Tough economic environment saw new jobs contract by 8,700 for 2016 to drop to 832,900 compared to 841,600 new jobs generated in 2015.
The environment also saw companies lay off workers, especially in the banking sector, where there was a decelerated growth of 3.7 percent in the financial and insurance activities.
Of the new jobs, the informal sector remains the highest employer generating 747, 300 new jobs in the period under review which compares to 85,600 new jobs in the formal sector.
Total employment outside small scale farming and pastoralist activities stood at 16 million persons in 2016, up from 15.2 million recorded the previous year.
Further, the number of self-employed and unpaid family workers within the modern sector went up from 123, 200 persons in 2015 to 132,500 persons in 2016.
Wage employment in the private sector increased by 3.3 percent from 1,759,600 persons in 2015 to 1,817,200 persons in 2016.
In the public sector, wage employment increased to 737,100 last year from 718,400.
Nominal wage earnings increased by 9.1 percent from Sh1.5 billion in 2015 to Sh1.6 billion in 2016.
Total wage payments in the public sector increased by 9.1 percent from Sh461.7 billion in 2015 to Sh503.5 billion in 2016.
The share of County Governments wage payments to the total public sector was 19.1 percent in 2016. Wage payments in the private sector increased by 9.2 percent to Sh1.14 billion last year.
Broken down, the construction industry with a share of 8.5 percent in wage employment recorded a growth of 10.6 percent, bring in 14,800 new jobs.
The survey has attributed the growth to continued government efforts in implementation of infrastructure and energy flagship projects under Vision 2030.
Education and wholesale and retail trade sectors created 7,800 new jobs each, while manufacturing industry created 5,300 new jobs.
Growth in employment numbers was also recorded in water supply, sewerage, water management and remediation activities, which posted a 14.3 percent growth.
Electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning supply also recorded a growth of 11.1 percent.
Annual average wage earnings grew by 5.9 percent to Sh644.8 in 2016. Annual inflation decelerated from 6.6 percent in 2015 to 6.3 percent in 2016. This is largely due to reduced costs of petroleum products and tight monetary policies.
