Croatian employers expect the pace of hiring to slow in the first quarter of 2020, an employment outlook survey conducted by the Manpower hiring company showed on Tuesday.

The planned hiring rate for the first quarter of 2020 is 2 percentage points lower than in the last quarter of 2019 and 9 percentage points lower than in the first quarter of 2019.

The ManpowerGroup Employment Outlook Survey of hiring prospects for the first quarter of 2020 was carried out on a sample of 620 employers in Croatia. All survey participants were asked, “How do you anticipate total employment at your location to change in the three months to the end of March 2020 as compared to the current quarter?”

The results show that 15% of the Croatian employers interviewed expect an increase in the number of employees in the next quarter, 10% expect a decrease and 72% no change, which results in the net employment outlook of 5%. This figure is derived by taking the percentage of employers anticipating total employment to increase and subtracting from this the percentage expecting to see a decrease in employment at their location in the next quarter, Manpower explained.

The results of the employment outlook survey show that Croatia continues to maintain a stable position in relation to EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa) countries.

On the labour market, there remain a large number vacancies for all people actively seeking a job in Croatia, said Nuno Gameiro, Manpower’s regional director for southeastern Europe.

The survey further reveals an expected increase in hiring in seven of the eight industry sectors in Croatia from January to March next year, with only Restaurants & Hotels expected to see a decrease in the number of employees.

The strongest hiring pace is expected by employers in Construction, with a net employment outlook of +32%. Manufacturing sector employers anticipate an upbeat hiring pace, with an outlook of +20%, which is an increase of 18% over the previous quarter, while employers in the Finance, Insurance, Real Estate and Business Service sector expect hiring to increase by 9%.

On the other hand, Restaurants & Hotels sector employers expect a drop in hiring, reporting a gloomy outlook of -17% (-13% in the Hotels sector and -6% in the Restaurants sector) compared with the last quarter of 2019.