Global recovery not translating into jobs: ILO

Global economic recovery is not resulting in job creation, as the number of the unemployed people worldwide stood at a record 205 million last year, the International Labour Organization (ILO) warned.

Despite a sharp recovery in the economic growth in many countries, global unemployment remained essentially unchanged in 2010 compared with 2009, ILO said.

Also, the number of unemployed last year was 27.6 million more against the figure in 2007 since the global financial crisis started.

ILO projects the global unemployment rate at 6.1 percent in 2011, with an estimated 203.3 million unemployed people.

According to the UN labor agency, industrialized nations and the European Union accounted for increase in global unemployment between 2007 and 2010, while the region has only 15 percent of the global work force. Many young people who entered the working age group are also not successful in finding the jobs, it said.

However, the jobless rates have reached pre-crisis levels in developing economies such as Brazil, Kazakhstan, Thailand, and Uruguay, the agency noted.

In spite of a highly differentiated recovery in labour markets across the world, the tremendous human costs of the recession are still with us, said Juan Somavia, director-general, ILO.

Further, around 1.53 billion people globally are under vulnerable employment holding temporary jobs, ILO said.

The incidence of vulnerable employment has remained broadly unchanged since 2008, in sharp contrast to the steady and significant average decline in the years preceding the crisis, it said.

Most alarmingly, the number of unemployed young people rose to 78 million in 2010, up from pre-crisis level of 73.5 million in 2007.

The weak recovery in decent work reinforces a persistent inability of the world economy to secure a future for all youth. This undermines families, social cohesion and the credibility of policies, Somavia said.