Surrey Board of Trade’s latest labour market report indicates there was an “impressive” four per cent increase in employment in this city in August – 11,793 jobs more than before the outset of the pandemic in February 2020 and nearly 37,000 higher than the lowest job levels recorded in April of that year.
“Tracking labour market trends in an ongoing way is important to ensure our policy framework is focused on developing a suitably skilled workforce, a broad availability of good-quality education as a foundation for future training, and a close matching of skills supply to the needs of enterprises and labour markets,” said Anita Huberman, CEO of the board. “It enables workers and enterprises to adjust to changes in technology and markets, and to anticipate and prepare for the skills needs of the future. This will fuel innovation, investment, economic diversification and competitiveness, as well as social and occupational mobility.”
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Huberman said Surrey’s job recovery is being led by the health care, natural resources, public administration and tech while education, law and social, community and government services sector are still down by 4.1 per cent – almost 1,100 jobs in Surrey – below that of February 2020.
But a “bright spot,” she says, for the first time since the pandemic started is that Surrey’s information, culture and recreation sector has seen a 30 per cent increase – roughly 2,800 more jobs.
Huberman also noted that while some services like finance, trade and construction jobs “continue to lag,” other sectors have shown “significant” recovery in the wake of COVID-19 restrictions being lifted, including the accommodation and food service sectors.
tom.zytaruk@surreynowleader.com
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