The real average salary for a Kenyan dropped by 2.8 per cent to Ksh30,750.35 monthly in 2017 compared to Ksh31,664.075 recorded during the previous period, according to a recent report by Kenya National Bureau of Statistics.
The earnings, despite increasing by 6.1 per cent to average Ksh57,008.1 per month last year, was impacted negatively by increase in ‘year on year’ inflation in June 2017 which stood at 9.2 per cent, up from 5.8 per cent in 2016. In the public sector, real average earnings declined by 6.9 per cent and fell by 1.1 per cent in the private sector.
According to Economic Survey 2018, wage employment in the Private Sector recorded a decelerated growth of 2.7 per cent in 2017 compared to a 3.3 per cent growth in 2016. Similarly, the number of new jobs created within self-employment recorded a decelerated growth of 5.2 per cent from 7.5 per cent growth the previous year.
Overall, wage employment grew by 4.0 per cent in 2017 to register 16.9 million jobs compared to 3.1 per cent in 2016 as majority of the sectors recorded improved performance in employment.
In private sector, 1.9 million jobs were available, a 2.7 per cent improvement from the previous year. However, the contribution of employment by the sector to formal sector employment declined from 71.2 per cent in 2016 to 70.3 per cent in 2017. The sector created 49.2 thousand new jobs compared to 57.6 thousand jobs created in 2016.
The informal sector, which constituted 83.4 per cent of the total employment, created 787,800 new jobs in 2017.
The total number of self-employed and unpaid family workers within the modern sector was estimated to have increased from 132,500 in 2016 to 139,400 in 2017.
“The new jobs from the self-employed category could be attributed to business start ups by women and youth due to the ease in accessing low cost credit from government programmes such as the Uwezo Fund,” said the report.
The number of new jobs created in the modern sector were 110,000 in 2017 compared to 84,800 thousand jobs created in 2016.
“The new jobs included the extra personnel engaged in the public sector to serve in the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission and recruitment in the essential services which include health, education and security services,” added the report.
