Survey: More women take up education, forestry, fishing jobs

The majority of Kenya’s female employees are working in the education, agriculture, forestry, fishing, public administration and defence sectors, a new report reveals.

The education sector, which has the highest number of female employees, registered an improvement last year with the number growing to 281,000 from 261,000 in the year 2018. Agriculture, forestry and fishing sector had 123,000 women in 2019 from 111,000 in 2018.

According to the Economic Survey 2020, public administration and defence, compulsory social security had 141,000 female employees in 2019 compared to 96000 in 2018.

Male employees, however, dominate all the sectors of the economy. In 2019, male employees accounted for 64.5 per cent of the total wage employment in the modern sector.

Overall, casual employment registered a growth of 6.0 per cent and accounted for 23.4 per cent of the total wage employment.

Overall, there was a 2.6 per cent growth in employment in the public sector in 2019 compared to 1.2 per cent in 2018.
The Teachers Service Commission (TSC), which is the largest employer in the public sector, registered a growth of 3.5 per cent in employment in 2019.

County governments’ employment level registered the highest rise of 6.4 per cent in the review period to stand at 190.0 thousand persons.

Employment in corporations controlled by government declined by 0.4 per cent while that of parastatal bodies declined by 0.5 per cent in 2019.

During the year under review, employment in ministries and other extra-budgetary institutions, registered a decelerated growth of 0.3 per cent compared to an increase of 4.5 per cent in 2018.

Overall, annual average earnings grew by 8.1 per cent to Sh 778,248.0 in 2019. This translates to an average monthly earning of Sh 64,854.0.

The annual average earnings in the private sector increased by 8.2 per cent to 780.1 thousand in 2019, compared to a growth of 7.9 in the public sector, over the same period.