On October 12, Minsk /BELTA correspondent/. The number of vacant jobs in the state employment service vacancy bank continues to grow in Belarus, the main department of employment policy and population of the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection informed a BELTA correspondent. Based on employer requests, as of October 1, there were 57.2 thousand vacant jobs in the republic, which is 33.6% more than a year ago. The conditional employment rate for unemployed persons in vacancies in January-September of the current year was 159.3% (in January-September 2009, this figure was 101.4%). Thus, for every 10 unemployed persons, there are currently conditionally 16 vacancies, while a year ago the number of job applicants was practically equal to the number of vacancies available to employers. By the way, as of October 1, 35.9 thousand people had the status of unemployed (14.9% less compared to October 1 of last year). In September, the demand for labour increased across the republic. For instance, if in July the number of vacancies increased by 0.9 thousand, and in August by 0.1 thousand, then in September it increased by 1.6 thousand. This is partly due to seasonality: with the beginning of the autumn-winter period, workers are needed for boiler rooms, cloakrooms, etc. According to specialists, a structural imbalance between the supply and demand of labour continues to persist in the country's labour market: 80.3% of the total number of vacancies are for blue-collar workers. There is also a noticeable territorial imbalance: every third vacancy from the republican vacancy bank is in Minsk (18.8 thousand). At the same time, in the capital, there are almost 5 times more vacant jobs than unemployed people. The number of vacancies exceeds the number of unemployed in Brest, Vitebsk, Grodno, Minsk, and Mogilev regions. Only in the Gomel region is the supply of labour greater than the demand for it: 6.5 thousand unemployed people conditionally apply for 6 thousand vacancies. -0-

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