Private sector job vacancies surged to 41,510 in June, up 9% on the same month last year, the Census & Statistics Department says.

Private sector employees rose by 1.8% to 2,370,400. Among them, the import-export trade engaged 513,900 people, the retail trade had 229,300, the business services had 217,100, and restaurants had 197,000.

The majority of the surveyed sectors recorded increases in employees, such as hotels and boarding houses (+9.6% ), real estate (+5.7%), restaurants (+4.7%), business services (+4.5%), and medical, health and related services (+4.4%). Yet falls were seen in the construction (-12.9%), communications (-5.9%) and wholesale trade (-5.4%) sectors.

Of the private sector vacancies, 7,450 were in trade, 4,730 in business services, 4,580 in financing and insurance, and 3,830 in retail trade.

Analysed by major occupation category, private sector vacancies were observed mainly for associate professionals (14,630), for service workers and shop sales workers (8,900), and for clerks (7,020).