Joblessness down, but bosses remain jittery
Although the 2005 unemployment rate is the lowest in the past three years, employers are worrying that the current political uncertainty will cause investment to slow.
Ampon Kittiampon, secretary-general of the National Economic and Social Development Board (NESDB), said yesterday that the number of continuously employed people had risen from 33.8 million in 2003 to 35.3 million in 2005, although the unemployment rate was only 1.7 per cent thanks to the economic expansion over the past three years. He added that the educational level among employed people had increased. The proportion of workers holding primary education or lower had dropped from 62.9 per cent in 2003 to 60.5 per cent in 2005. "Despite the political situation, for 2006 we predict that the unemployment rate won't rise above 2 per cent. But if investment slows, workers with degrees or higher will be affected. There would be no problems, though, for labourers," Ampon said. He added that the situation was causing concern because there were more than 100,000 academic graduates each year; a figure that would continue to grow. In terms of the nation's health, most Thais are fit. In the last three months of 2005, the number of patients suffering nine major diseases on the watch list, including measles, dysentery, pneumonia, leptospirosis and hand-foot-and-mouth disease dropped from 34,330 in 2004 to 29,278 (14 per cent) in 2005. However, Ampon said the number of patients getting hand-foot-and-mouth disease, mainly spread among three- to five-year-old children, had risen worryingly from the previous year. "Although an alert Public Health Ministry monitored the spread of the disease in kindergartens and helped reduce patient numbers in the last quarter, 2005 was the first year when patient numbers increased significantly." The number of patients peaked in the second quarter of 2005 at 2,259 before dropping to 426 in the fourth quarter. However, the number increased from a lowly 71 in the fourth quarter of 2004. The number of road deaths and accidents in 2005 dropped by 2 per cent from 2004. Threat to life as well as physical and sexual abuse decreased by 2.4 per cent, while threats to property increased by 6.5 per cent. Drug cases rose from 74,000 in 2004 to more than 100,000 last year. Chatrarat Kaewmorakot The Nation
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