Employers said they are continuously hiring, but stressed that the most qualified applicants will get the first crack at job openings as the local labor pool persists to be bogged down by mismatch in skills against industry demand. Sergio Ortiz-Luis, Jr., president of the Employers Confederation of the Philippines (ECOP) at the Laging Handa Public Briefing, said they are closely collaborating with the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) to set up more training schools to be able to produce the right skills needed by companies. “It is but natural that hirers will choose in the order of priorities the most qualified,” he said. He said that ECOP members and TESDA are working together to address the skills mismatch between demand and skills of new graduates. In fact, he said, ECOP would like TESDA to open more schools in the rural areas to upskill and retool local workers to suit the needs of industries. He said the improvement in the country’s latest job report is largely due to the continued hiring in the services sector and the accelerated implementation of government’s priority infrastructure projects. During the pandemic, ECOP and other business organizations have committed to hire a million jobs. Unemployment rate declined to 4.8 percent in February, but getting a secure work remains a challenge for many Filipinos as the number of job seekers increased, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) reported. Based on the PSA Labor Force Survey covering February 2023, the country’s jobless rate dropped to 4.8 percent from 6.4 percent in the same month last year, but remained unchanged from January’s levels. There were 2.47 million jobless Filipinos in the second month of the year, down 21 percent from 3.13 million a year earlier. However, this number increased by four percent compared with last January’s 2.37 million. Aside from the construction sector, Ortiz-Luis said the tourism sector is  “slowly but surely picking up” and would drive up demand because of its wide linkage to other sectors. There is also a big hiring opportunity once the government relaxes the requirements in the mining sector to allow more foreign investors. In addition, the country’s participation in the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) is expected to create more demand for workers. He agreed with the statement of the National Economic and Development Authority that RCEP and the amended Public Service Act would help create high paying jobs. Ortiz-Luis even said that employment in neighboring countries is being fueled by their free trade agreements, as he cited Thailand with 20 bilateral FTAs as against three of the Philippines. “RCEP and other FTAs are a big help,” he said. On the clamor to raise the daily wage rate by P750, Ortiz-Luis said this will adversely impact not just on small businesses but the entire economy. He reiterated that a mandated wage hike will only benefit 16 percent of the country’s total labor force but would leave behind the 84 or 90 percent, comprising of the informal sector such as the self-employed, market vendors, tricycle drivers, among others. This will only lead to higher salary, reduction of number of workers or raise prices of their products, he warned. “This is more problematic because this means higher inflation,” he explained. “It’s good to hear of increasing minimum wage, but since the informal sector is 86 percent of total workforce, the ending is the entire economic is affected by higher consumer prices,” he said.