16 August 2017
RIYADH – Saudi Arabia has witnessed a three percent overall increase in online recruitment activity with an increase of 11 percent in the healthcare industry from Q1 2017 to Q2 2017, according to the latest Monster Employment Index (MEI).

The healthcare industry in KSA recorded the highest growth in online recruitment among all monitored industries from Q1 2017 and has also witnessed the highest year-on-year growth at 12 percent from Q2 2016. The growth in opportunities in the healthcare sector comes despite a slowdown in overall online recruitment activity from the same period last year with 14 percent decline from Q2 2016.

“KSA has witnessed low activity levels in online hiring over the past year or so, however, it is encouraging to see that the Kingdom has improved slightly in online hiring over the first half of the year. There are many developments taking place across KSA and a heavy emphasis is being placed on healthcare in efforts to improve the industry and the wellbeing of the Saudi population. This has been reflected in the Q2 MEI findings where the industry is continuing to hire online,” said Sanjay Modi, Managing Director, Monster.com, APAC & Middle East.

Other industries to show growth from Q1 2017 are consumer goods (including FMCG, food and packaged food, home appliances, garments, textiles, leather, gems and jewelry), banking/financial services/insurance (BFSI), and marketing (including advertising, market research, public relations, media and entertainment) recording seven, six and five percent respectively.

Occupations showing growth from Q1 2017 include software/hardware/telecom, marketing/arts, and finance and accounting at seven, six, and four percent respectively.

Looking at figures from Q2 2016, industries other than healthcare recording year-on-year growth include education, consumer goods, and BSFI with four percent growth each while engineering and production was the only occupation to report growth at two percent.

The only industries to decline on the Q2 MEI from Q1 2017 were IT/telecom/ISP and chemicals/ plastic/ rubber/ paint/ fertilizer/ pesticides at three and two percent respectively while in occupations only purchase/ logistics/ supply chain declined at four percent.

© The Saudi Gazette 2017