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Growth in South Korea's labor productivity accelerated in the fourth quarter of
2011 from three months earlier, helped by solid export gains, a government
report showed Wednesday.
According to the report by the Ministry of
Knowledge Economy, the labor productivity index for all industries in the three
month period increased 3.3 percent on-year to 112.6, up from 109.0 tallied a
year earlier.
The on-year growth rate of labor productivity sank to
1.1 percent in the third quarter of last year after reaching 3 percent in the
second quarter and 4 percent in the first quarter, mainly due to sluggish
economic growth brought on by eurozone woes and high commodities prices. South
Korea's economy grew 3.8 percent in 2011 down from 6.2 percent in the previous
year.
Labor productivity is measured by dividing total industrial
output with total labor input during a given period of time.
The
latest report showed labor output rising 3.4 percent with input, which
translates to both the number of workers and overall labor time edging up just
0.1 percent.
"Exports jumping 19.3 percent compared to the year before
to reach a record high of US$556.5 billion contributed to the improvements in
the index numbers," a ministry official said.
For the manufacturing
sector, labor productivity rose 7.8 percent on-year to 124.3 in the fourth
quarter, while service industries posted a gain of 2.2 percent to
108.6.
The report, in addition showed labor productivity for all
industries moving up 2.8 percent on-year to 111.6 for the whole of last year,
with manufacturing and services numbers also gaining 6.5 percent and 2.2 percent
respectively. The productivity reading of 111.6 is the highest reached so
far.
Productivity for manufacturers reached 123.0 from 115.5 in 2010,
with the service sector number hitting 108.5 vis-a-vis 106.2 tallied for the
previous year.
Source Text