The Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) released results of the Survey on Manpower Needs and Wages for the fourth quarter of 2014. Survey coverage comprised Wholesale & Retail Trade; Transport, Storage & Communications; Security Activities and Public Sewage & Refuse Disposal Activities, excluding own-account workers.

At the end of the fourth quarter of 2014, Wholesale & Retail Trade had 49,837 persons engaged, up by 8.8% year-on-year, with 32,146 working in Retail trade. In December, average earnings (excluding bonuses and allowances) of full-time employees rose by 2.0% year-on-year to MOP11,960.

Transport, Storage & Communications had 10,028 persons engaged, up by 8.7% year-on-year. Average earnings of full-time employees in December rose by 11.5% year-on-year to MOP20,310.

Security Activities had 8,668 persons engaged, up substantially by 48.8% year-on-year. Average earnings of full-time employees in December rose by 17.2% year-on-year to MOP11,170.

Public Sewage & Refuse Disposal Activities had 784 persons engaged, up by 6.5% year-on-year. Average earnings of full-time employees in December increased by 1.0% year-on-year to MOP14,670.

At the end of the fourth quarter of 2014, Wholesale & Retail Trade had 4,776 vacancies, up by 928 year-on-year, with 3,103 posts in Retail Trade. Vacancies in Security Activities rose by 425 year-on-year to 1,413.

In terms of recruitment prerequisites, about 81.4% of the vacancies in Security Activities required junior secondary education or lower. As for language skills, besides Cantonese, 79.0% and 51.1% of the vacancies in Security Activities required knowledge of Mandarin and English; the respective rate in Retail trade was 73.1% and 56.1%.

In the fourth quarter of 2014, the vacancy rate in Security Activities reached 14.5%, while that in other surveyed industries registered year-on-year increase, indicating that many vacancies in these industries were still unoccupied.

As regards vocational training in the surveyed industries, a total of 11,557 participants attended training courses organized, co-organized or sponsored by the establishment in the fourth quarter of 2014. Wholesale & Retail Trade had the largest number of participants (6,526), and most of them (62.4%) attended courses in “Business & Administration”; Transport, Storage & Communications had 3,440 participants, with 63.6% attending courses in “Services”.