KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 9 ― The unemployment rate in Malaysia has climbed to 4.8 per cent in June 2021 involving 768,700 persons, the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM) reported today in the Statistics of Labour Force, Malaysia, June and second quarter of 2021.

Chief Statistician Datuk Seri Mohd Uzir Mahidin said the unemployment rate for May 2021 was at 4.5 per cent with 728,100 unemployed persons.

He said as the country continued to endeavour in flattening the surge of Covid-19 cases, the labour force was faced with a challenging situation in June following the implementation of the full movement control order whereby only essential economic and services sectors were permitted to operate.

"Hence, the number of employed persons in June 2021 declined by 0.5 per cent to record 15.3 million persons (compared to 15.37 million in May 2021) with employment-to-population ratio fell by 0.4 percentage points to 65 per cent,” he said in a statement.

In addition, he said some of the labour force had moved into inactivity which led to a decline to 16.07 million persons compared to 16.1 million persons in the previous month, and it was the first decrease recorded since April 2020 when the pandemic hit the country.

Meanwhile, self-employed individuals recorded an addition of 4,100 persons to 2.5 million persons compared to May 2021 (2.49 million persons).

Elaborating on the unemployment rate for June 2021, Mohd Uzir said the actively unemployed, which comprised 83.6 per cent of the total unemployed persons, recorded an increase of 33,000 persons to 642,900 persons compared to 609,900 persons in May.

"Those who were unemployed for less than three months accounted for 52.3 per cent of the actively unemployed while 9.8 per cent was those in long-term unemployment of more than a year,” he said.

On the overall performance for the second quarter of 2021, Mohd Uzir said the number of labour force reduced by 36,100 persons to 15.97 million persons as both employed and unemployed persons declined.

He added that the unemployment rate for the second quarter stood at 4.8 per cent or 764,900 persons.

Five states recording the highest unemployment rate in the second quarter of 2021 are Labuan with 8.8 per cent, followed by Sabah (8.7 per cent), Perlis (5.3 per cent), Kelantan (4.8 per cent) and Selangor (4.4 per cent), he said. ― Bernama