The Congress of South African Trade Unions is shocked at the revelation in yesterday's Statistics South Africa's Labour Force Survey that unemployment is still rising - by 1% from the fourth quarter of 2010 to the first quarter of 2011.
This brings the official unemployment level to 25%. The expanded definition, that includes the growing number of workers who have given up looking for employment, now stands at 35.5%.
In human terms these statistics mean that 227 000 more people joined the ranks of the unemployed between the fourth and the first quarters. They show that for the workers there is still no end to the recession, despite economic growth of over 4%.
There was an increase of 3.4% - 486 000 people - in the number of persons "not economically active", of which 353 000 were "discouraged work-seekers", an increase of 73 000 over the same quarter in 2010. Unless these trends can be reversed, we are heading for a massive political and socio-economic catastrophe.
The job-loss bloodbath continues, bringing misery to thousands more families, and represents a huge waste of human resources, of workers who could be building new homes or improving our services, but who are left idle and demoralised.
It is noteworthy however that in the same quarter, jobs in the formal sector increased by 56 000, but this was more than cancelled out by the loss of 46 000 jobs in the informal 24 000 jobs in agriculture.
This proves COSATU's point that casualisation of labour and the expansion of informal and atypical forms of employment has made thousands of workers more insecure and vulnerable to being summarily retrenched. It will strengthen our determination to end casualisation and labour broking.
These figures show that the government is absolutely correct to make job creation its top priority and makes the ambitious plans in the Industrial Policy Action Plan and the New Growth Path, and their target of creating 5 million new jobs by 2020, even more relevant.
It is now time however to turn works into deeds. Workers will lose confidence in ambitions plans and targets if they see no new jobs actually being created.
While forging ahead with the NGP's plans to restructure the economy and basing it more on manufacturing industry, it is essential to start employing workers in the short term, especially on projects to improve service delivery and the quality of life in poor communities.
COSATU will also use these statistics to support its call for a substantial cut in interest rates to encourage new investment in job-creating industries and services.
Statement issued by Patrick Craven, COSATU national spokesperson, May 4 2011
Click here to sign up to receive our free daily headline email newsletter
