Employment demand rises as economy recovers The demand for workers from Vietnamese enterprises was reported 34 percent higher in the first half of the year in comparison with the same period last year.   The reports by the HCM City Labor Force Forecasting and Marketing Information Center showed an increase in employment demand thanks to economic recovery. The labor force supply and demand, which declined sharply in 2012, have bounced back with an increase of 3 and 4 percent, respectively, in the first six months of the year. The statistics from online job websites showed the same situation. According to VietnamWorks, businesses tend to employ more workers this year with demand higher than the same period last year, the highest growth rate in the last three years. Gaku Echizenya, managing director of VietnamWorks, noted that workers now have bigger choices than ever before. The job website noted that the real estate sector has seen the strongest recovery with worker demand up by 98 percent, followed by consultancy (95 percent), wholesale and retail (58 percent), advertisement (51 percent) and production (49 percent). The demand for workers is very high in the information technology sector with 1,200 more jobs needed in the first half of the year than the same period of 2014. Meanwhile, architecture and interior decoration, which previously had low demand, also offered 600 new jobs. Chair of the Vietnam Software and IT Services Association, Truong Gia Binh, said Vietnam would lack 400,000 workers in the information technology sector by 2020. The report on consumer confidence released by ANZ Bank showed that Vietnamese consumer optimism had reached the highest level since the bank began analyzing the issue by measuring confidence in personal finance and economic performance for the next 12 months. The confidence index climbed to 143.1 points in June, or 10 points higher than the same period last year. A recent report by the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation (HSBC) showed that the labor force is one of the greatest advantages of Vietnam. Vietnam has a large workforce (the second largest in South East Asia after Indonesia). This, plus the other population characteristics, gives Vietnam certain advantages and a competitive edge, especially compared with other East Asian markets such as China, Japan, Mongolia and South Korea. However, the competitive edge remains a big question as labor quality remains low. A report by the International Labor Organization showed that despite improvements in recent years, Vietnamese productivity is equal to only 1/3 of Thailand and China’ productivity rate and 1/6 of Malaysia’s. NCDT