THERE are more unemployed people in Davao Region this year compared to last year, the labor department said.
Records from the Department of Labor and Employment (Dole)-Davao Region reported that unemployment rate increased to 5.9 percent in January 2017 from 5.1 percent in the same period in 2016.
Dole Davao Regional Director Joffrey Suyao said this increase can be linked to the increase of the region’s labor force from more than 2 million January 2016 to more than 2.1 million as of January 2017.
Suyao said Davao Region is still considered an agricultural area and the onslaught of natural calamities like flooding and drought, may have contributed for the migration of agricultural workers to urban centers to look for other jobs.
“Infrastructure construction, hotel services, and similar industries in the city currently need workers. If we have workers who are coming from the provinces, our work force will really increase. If our work force increases, we also need jobs. But some of these work forces do not fit. They do not have the skills, they lack training. So they could still be not employed,” said Suyao.
He said the technical courses of Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (Tesda) will be able to help upgrade the skills of the students depending on the job requirement and to be able to get the job they are applying for.
Suyao also said the importance of different government agencies such as the Department of Trade and Industry, Tesda, and Dole with the different industries, is to be able to match the labor force requirement with the skills of the job.
“We are employment facilitators. We facilitate the employment of these people so we can bring them to the employers. If they do not have the right skills for the job, we encourage them to acquire skills,” said Suyao.
