Newfoundland and Labrador

The labour market in Newfoundland and Labrador continues to improve

• Despite hitting a record high in 2003, Newfoundland and Labrador's annual employment rate has never exceeded 50% and has always been lower than that of the other provinces. From 1997 to 2003, strong job growth averaging 2.2% per year boosted the employment rate by more than 7 percentage points to 49.6%. The current gap between Newfoundland and Labrador's employment rate and the national average is the smallest it has ever been.
• In 2003, while oil was credited for a 6.5% hike in the provincial gross domestic product, the mining, oil and gas extraction industry added fewer jobs than several other sectors that year, including health care and social assistance, transportation and warehousing, and other services. In total, there was a net gain of approximately 4,000 jobs (+1.8%) from 2002 to 2003.
• The unemployment rate in Newfoundland and Labrador has varied little since 1999 and was 16.7% in 2003. Over the past three decades, the province has consistently had the highest unemployment rate in the country. The unemployment rate has remained at its current level in recent years, in part because of an increase in the province's labour force participation rate, which reached an all-time high of 59.5% in 2003.

Enlarge chart