Hiring activity declines by 15% in April amid second Covid-19 wave: Report

With lockdown-like restrictions in many states due to the second wave of Covid-19 pandemic, hiring activity declined by 15 per cent sequentially in April, according to a report.

The decline, however, is less severe compared to the last year given the lack of strict nationwide lockdown, the report said.

According to the Naukri JobSpeak Index, there were 2,072 job postings in April compared to 2,436 job postings in March.

"The disruption caused by the second wave of Covid-19 has impacted the hiring activity leading to a 15 per cent sequential decline in April.

"However, the current impact on the job market is less severe than what we saw in April 2020, where the Naukri JobSpeak index declined by 51 per cent month-on-month. This could be attributed to the lack of a strict nationwide lockdown being announced this time and the economy remaining open," Naukri.com Chief Business Officer Pawan Goyal said.

The Naukri JobSpeak is a monthly Index that calculates and records hiring activity based on the job listings on Naukri.com website month on month.

Insurance (5 per cent decline), pharma/biotech (-9 per cent) and medical/healthcare (-10 per cent) were among the less impacted sectors in April compared with March, it said.

The IT-software sector with a decline of 12 per cent, which remained shielded and drove robust hiring over the past few months, declined less than the national average sequentially.

Other sectors such as FMCG (-15 per cent) and telecom (-15 per cent) declined in line with the overall hiring trend in April against March.

The retail sector, which grew in March, experienced a sharp decline of 33 per cent in April due to restricted operating hours or closure owing to lockdowns in many parts of the country.

Sectors such as hospitality and travel (-36 per cent), banking/finance (-26 per cent) and teaching/education (-24 per cent) remained highly impacted in hiring activity in April against March, it stated.

The jobs market across metro and non-metro cities saw a downfall, barring Kolkata that remained flat.

The aggressive surge of Covid-19 cases in Maharashtra directly impacted hiring trends in Mumbai, which saw a sequential decline of 20 per cent in April.

While Delhi/NCR with a decline of 18 per cent also remained impacted sequentially, followed by Bangalore 10 per cent, Chennai 10 per cent and Hyderabad 4 per cent.

Jaipur with a dip of 25 per cent and Chandigarh with 23 per cent led the decline in hiring in tier-II cities while Cochin with a decline of 5 per cent remained the least impacted sequentially.

Interestingly, Ahmedabad, which was showing robust growth in hiring over the past few months showed a decline of 12 per cent in hiring in April compared with March, the report noted.

The shutdown of schools, hotels, and non-essential offices led to a sequential decline in demand for professionals in the teaching/education (-32 per cent), hospitality (-32 per cent) and marketing/advertising (-26 per cent) domains in April.

Hiring activity across experience bands saw an average decline of 13 per cent in April compared to March, it added.