PETALING JAYA: Malaysia’s labour productivity, as measured by value-added per employment, grew 13.6% year-on-year (y-o-y) for the second quarter of 2021 due to low-base effect.

       However, when compared with the preceding quarter, the country’s labour productivity declined, albeit at a slower pace of 1.8% quarter-on-quarter (q-o-q) compared with a contraction of 4.6% q-o-q in the first quarter of this year.

       In a statement, the Statistics Department said the y-o-y labour productivity growth in the second quarter came after five consecutive quarters on the declining trend.

       For the three months to June 2021, labour productivity based on value-added per employment rebounded to a growth of 13.6% y-o-y to RM22,117, compared with a decline of 0.4% y-o-y to RM22,513 in the first quarter of the year, said chief statistician Datuk Seri Dr Mohd Uzir Mahidin.(pic)

       “The strong growth was attributed to the lower base registered a year ago, which was negative 16.1% y-o-y at RM19,467,” he said.

       During the second quarter of this year, the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) grew 16.1% y-o-y, compared with a contraction of 0.5% y-o-y in the preceding quarter, while employment, which recorded a total of 15.2 million persons, improved by 2.2% against marginal contraction of 0.04% in the first quarter.

       For the three months to June 2021, labour productivity based on value-added per employment rebounded to a growth of 13.6% y-o-y to RM22,117, compared with a decline of 0.4% y-o-y to RM22,513 in the first quarter of the year, said chief statistician Datuk Seri Dr Mohd Uzir Mahidin.(pic)

       Mohd Uzir said the total hours worked increased by 33.2% y-o-y to 8.3 billion hours in the second quarter compared with a decline of 0.8% to 8.5 billion hours in the first quarter.

       This resulted in the labour productivity by value-added per hour worked falling 12.8% y-o-y to RM40.50 per hour for the period in review, compared with 0.4% y-o-y growth to RM40.20 per hour in the preceding quarter.

       “The decline in labour productivity in this quarter was led by a larger increase in total hours worked than growth rate in value added.

       “In addition, the total hours worked recorded in this quarter was the second lowest after the second quarter of 2020 (6.2 billion hours worked) due to the constraint of business operation hours following the stringent containment measures,” Mohd Uzir explained.

       He said the ability of businesses to adopt and keep up with the digitalisation and technological advancement would elevate the efficiency and subsequently business growth in the long run.

       By adopting automation, coupled with the retrained and upskilled existing workers, businesses might be able to optimise productivity and create resilient economic growth, he added.

       As for labour productivity by value-added per employment by sector, construction grew 37.6% y-o-y in the second quarter compared with a contraction of 8.2% y-o-y in the preceding quarter.

       In the manufacturing sector, growth strengthened at 23.2% y-o-y from 5.5% y-o-y while for the mining and quarrying sector, growth was 14.1% y-o-y compared -4.2% y-o-y, and the services sector saw expansion of 11% y-o-y against -2.4% y-o-y.

       Agriculture was the only sector that registered a decline in labour productivity in the second quarter, falling 3.3% y-o-y compared with a growth of 0.9% in the first quarter.