Kazakhstan's employable population to reach 9.5 million people by 2017

The number of active employable population will grow by 2017 and will make 9.5 million people, Tengrinews.kz reports citing the official website of Kazakhstan Ministry of Labor and Social Protection. "The number of economically active population will reach 9.5 million people by 2017. Meanwhile, some of the regions of the country will see a decrease or a low growth of economically active population. Such regions are Akmola, Kostanay, North-Kazakhstan and East-Kazakhstan oblasts," the Ministry's press-service writes. The Ministry be making 5-year forecasts of the labor market development based on the labor resources balance starting from 2014. With the expected growth of the economy and economically active population the number of employed people is expected to make 9.16 million people by 2017, compared to 8.54 million people in the third quarter of 2012. Meanwhile, the Ministry notes that "growth of the number of employed people will be unbalanced region-wise". "The biggest growth of the number of the employed people will be seen in Astana (plus 107 thousand people by 2017) and the least growth in North-Kazakhstan oblast (plus 2.7 thousand people by 2017). No significant changes in the structure of distribution of employed people by types of economic activities is expected," the press-service writes. According to the Ministry's forecasts, the share of employed people in agriculture will continue lowering: from 26.5 percent in 2011 to 23 percent in 2017. "The economic growth will cause an increase in labor efficiency and decrease of the share of self-employed people by 2.4 percent," the authority says.