Northern Cape job growth leads at 9.6% Q1 2012

The Northern Cape is the employment-creation champion with a 9.6% increase in the first quarter 2012 compared with a 2.3% year-on-year (y/y) increase for the whole of SA, Statistics SA (Stats SA) said on Thursday.

The quarterly data is not seasonally adjusted, so it was better to look at the y/y change.

A total of six of the nine provinces had increases on the year. In percentage terms the gainers following the Northern Cape were Limpopo (6.0%), Mpumalanga (4.1%), KwaZulu-Natal (3.7%), and the Western Cape and Gauteng with 3.5% each. 

The losers were the Free State with a 5.5% y/y decline followed by the Eastern Cape with a 3.5% y/y drop and the North West with a 2.5% y/y decrease. 

In terms of number of jobs created over the past year, Gauteng leads with 141,000 followed by KwaZulu-Natal at 90,000, the Western Cape with 63,000, Limpopo with 56,000, Mpumalanga at 36,000 and the Northern Cape created only 25,000. Gauteng is the province with the largest number of people, while the Northern Cape has the fewest of the nine provinces. 

In the first quarter 2012, KwaZulu-Natal had the lowest unemployment rate at 20.5%, followed by Limpopo (21.9%), Western Cape (22.8%), Northern Cape (24.9%), Gauteng (26.0%), North West (26.2%), Eastern Cape (28.3%), Mpumalanga (30.3%) and the Free State (32.2%).