Japan’s non-regular employees, which includes temporary workers, dispatch workers, contractors, part-time workers and others, totalled 20.87 million in January 2022, steady when compared to the same period a year ago, according to data from Statistics Japan.

The number of ‘dispatched workers from temporary labour agencies’ saw no change over the year and stood at a total of 1.37 million while the number of temporary workers overall increased by 0.9% to 4.50 million.

Statistics Japan also published labour market data that showed the unemployment rate stood at 2.8% on a seasonally adjusted basis. This was a slight increase of 0.1% when compared to the previous month.

On a non-seasonally adjusted basis, the unemployment rate stood at 2.7%, down 0.2% from the previous year.

The country’s labour force participation rate stood at 61.7%, down 0.1% compared to the previous year.

The number of employed persons in October totalled 66.46 million, down 0.5% compared to the previous year.

By sector, the education and learning support sector saw a decline of 3.9% in January. On the other hand, scientific research, professional and technical services reported an increase of 2.4%.

The jobs to applicants ratio stood at 1.20 in January, up 0.03% from the previous month.