7,000 jobs up for Tacloban Labor Day applicants

TACLOBAN CITY, April 28  -- Some 7,000 jobs are up for grabs at the Labor Day job fair in Eastern Visayas, the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) announced Friday.

The fair, to be joined by 62 employers composed of government agencies, local business, and recruitment agencies offering overseas jobs, will be held at the Tacloban Convention Center on May 1.

It will also have a livelihood component for those interested in self-employment, such as counseling, product display and sales, franchising, sharing of success stories, skills training, and job generation tips.

“This is to give the unemployed the opportunity to find a job, and those with entrepreneurial bent, an opportunity to earn an income,” DOLE 8 (Eastern Visayas) Director Cyril Ticao said in a press briefing at the Leyte Park Hotel Friday afternoon.

Applicants were encouraged to pre-register at the DOLE regional office before May 1 so they can be matched with employers.

Of the 7,000 job vacancies, at least 3,000 are for overseas employment. The remaining slots are for jobs within the region.

For local jobs, participating employers are hardware stores, retail shops, hotels and restaurants, malls, sales and marketing, financial institutions, private school, hospital, information technology firm, and national government agencies.

“DOLE aims to prepare the jobseekers, our future workers to be employed with jobs in which they can take pride with. We have several activities designed to fast-track the matching of jobseekers and employers, particularly in identified industries where skills are highly in demand,” Ticao told reporters.

During Labor Day commemoration, the government will release PHP6.95 million livelihood grants to nine local government units and private organizations.

The region, composed of the provinces of Leyte, Samar, Biliran, Southern Leyte, Eastern Samar, and Northern Samar, has a workforce of about two million. Its employment rate stands at 96.3 percent as of last January.

Although jobless rate is low at only 3.7 percent, underemployment rate remains high at 19.4 percent, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA).

The PSA defines underemployed as “employed persons who express the desire to have additional hours of work in their present job, or to have additional job, or to have a new job with longer working hours.” (SQM/PNA)