South Korea's unemployment rate edged up in June, marking the first rise in four months, as sectors such as manufacturing and construction offered fewer jobs, a government report showed Wednesday.
The jobless rate stood at 3.4 percent last month, compared with 3.2 percent in May, according to the report by the National Statistical Office (NSO).
The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate in Asia's fourth-largest economy stood at 3.5 percent in June, up from 3.4 percent the previous month, the report showed.
The unemployment rate in June was slightly higher than the median forecast of 3.3 percent in a poll of 12 financial institutions and think tanks by Yonhap Infomax, the financial news arm of Yonhap News Agency.
The number of jobless people fell 6.6 percent to 58,000 in June from a year earlier, while the total number of employed edged up 1.1 percent to 23.05 million over the cited period, according to the report. The average number of the newly employed was 306,600 each month in the first half of the year, lower than the government's target of 320,000.
"The construction sector remained in a slump," said Lee Ho-seung, assistant director of the Finance Ministry's human resource development division. "But in the second half, the situation will improve."
Last week, the Finance Ministry cut its forecast for job growth this year as the recovery pace of the economy is predicted to slow down in the second half.
The South Korean economy is expected to grow around 5 percent this year on the back of improving domestic consumption and resilient exports following last year's 4 percent gain.
The Bank of Korea, the country's central bank, froze its key interest rate at 4.25 percent for July after raising it by a quarter of one percentage point last month.
But it strongly signaled that it may hike borrowing costs, citing increased inflationary pressure that stems from rising oil prices and an economic recovery.
Seoul, July 12 (Yonhap News)
S. Korean jobless rate rises to 3.4 pct in June |
