Seven Million Jobs Created in Formal Sector | 19 Jun 2019

The Indian Staffing Federation (ISF) has reported the formalisation of over seven million jobs between 2015-2018 due to reforms and initiatives taken by Indian government.

  • The report titled, ‘Impact of key reforms on job formalisation and flexi-staffing’ mentioned that 1.2 million workers have been added to the flexi-workforce since 2015 and a further 1.53 million are to be added over the next three years.
  • The government’s current agenda of job creation can be achieved by boosting the aggregate effective demand in the economy through formalisation, industrialisation, urbanisation, financialisation and skilling.
  • India will have a 6.1 million flexi-workforce by 2021.
    • Sectors such as logistics, banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI), IT/ ITeS, retail and government would be the top five sectors, employing over 55 per cent of the total flexi-workforce by 2021.
  • The flexi staff space grew at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 16.3 per cent in 2018 and is expected to further accelerate to 22.7 per cent from 2018-2021.
  • The report establishes flexi-staffing as a key job creation engine.
  • The acceleration in momentum towards formal employment witnessed in the past three years clearly means the reforms such as the payment of wages act and EPF are having a positive impact.

Flexi-staffing

  • Flexible Staffing is an arrangement in an organization where the employees can be from temporary agencies, leased employees or contract workers.
  • It is more commonly known as temporary staffing and predominantly focuses on the white collar industry.

Indian Staffing Federation (ISF)

  • The ISF is the apex body representing the Staffing industry/Private Employment Services that is authorised to discuss with government agencies and other trade bodies on behalf of the staffing industry/ private employment services.
    • The Staffing / private employment services is an enabler to provide social security and long term medical, and retirement benefits to temp/flexi-staff.
  • The purpose of ISF is to enhance long-term growth and ensure its continued ability to make positive contributions to the economy as well as the society through the services of the Staffing Industry.
  • Staffing Industry covers a meager 2% penetration of the possible employable size in India.
    • Of the 400m employable in India, about 10% are employed in the organised sector, and while about 250m are self-employed.
    • This leaves almost 110m who are employed by the temp/ flexi-staffing and the unorganised sector. ISF is working towards growing this market.
    • To bring effect, the laws and regulations haven't taken Staffing industry/ Private Employment Services into cognizance.
    • ISF expects to interact with law making authorities to recognize Staffing industry / Private Employment Services and create adequate and appropriate laws to manage it.