In January, the unemployment rate for the Stratford-Bruce Peninsula Economic Region, which includes the Municipality of Meaford, increased by 0.4 percentage points to 4.8%. The provincial unemployment rate increased by 0.2 percentage point to 5.8%, both unadjusted for seasonality.
In January, both the region’s overall population and labour force size increased by +400 whereas the size of population not participating in the labour force remained unchanged. Thus, the participation rate increased by 0.1 percentage point to 58.8%. That said, we saw a decrease of approximately -200 in total employment size, the number was a result of about -2,900 full-time employment losses compensated partly by around +2,600 part-time employment gains.
The number of Goods-producing sector employees increased this month. Manufacturing experienced the biggest gain (+1,600, +9.8%). However, Forestry, fishing, mining, quarrying and oil experienced the biggest percentage loss (-200, -6.3%), followed by Construction (-400, -2.4%) and Utilities (-200, -2.3%).
Employment in the Services-producing sector decreased this month. With 1,500 employment losses, educational services experienced the biggest percentage loss this month (-16%), followed by Wholesale and retail trade (-2,100, -9.2%) and Transportation and warehousing (-400, -7.7%). On the other hand, Public Administration experienced the biggest percentage gain this month (+700, +24.1%), followed by Health care and social assistance (+1,900, +10.7%) and Accommodation and food services (+700, +9.3%).
“Seeing our population and labour force size increase is a positive sign we are attracting the workforce we need to fill local vacancies” said Dana Soucie, Executive Director for the Four County Labour Market Planning Board. “Although we see a loss in full-time employment, it is offset with the gain in part-time employment which may support those who require flexible schedules to remain in the workforce.”
Current job postings for the Bruce, Grey, Huron, Perth region have increased over time since the pandemic and can be found at www.connect2JOBS.ca. The current number of job postings reached 2,990.
