Jason Berkes


	Services now create more jobs than farming
	For the first time since the end of the last Ice Age when agriculture began, it has been replaced as the main sector of employment in the world. According to the latest data released by ILO, agriculture employed 36.1 per cent of the world’s workforce as of 2006 while the services sector employed 42 per cent. Just a decade ago, in 1996, agriculture had employed 41.9 per cent, while services and industry had employed 37 per cent and 21.1 per cent respectively. But agriculture continues to be the chief employer in Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, South-East Asia and Pacific, and East Asia. This too, though, is on a declining trend, with decreases of 8.5 percentage points in Sub-Saharan Africa, 10.3 in South Asia, 5.6 in South-East Asia and 7.6 in East Asia. Overall, services are attracting much of the migration from agriculture except in South Asia, where industry is attracting more workers than services. *Jason Berkes* *www.jasonberkes.com* Tags: agriculture, farming, jason berkes


	Jason Berkes - For the first time in 10,000 years, farming is not the dominating industry
	For the first time in 10,000 years, farming not the dominating industry In recent years agriculture has lost its place as the main sector of employment and has been replaced by the services sector, which in 2006 constituted 42.0 per cent of world employment compared to 36.1 per cent for agriculture. As for the industry sector, it represented 21.9 per cent of total employment, which is almost unchanged from ten years ago. Although textbook theory suggests that economic development entails a structural transformation with a shift away from agriculture to the industry sector, this no longer seems to be reflected in reality. Instead of moving into high-productivity jobs in the industry sector, people are moving directly into the services sector, which consists of both high- and low-productivity jobs. Therefore, it is unclear if the sectoral shift goes hand in hand with productivity increases and thereby a better utilization of the workforce. Agriculture is still the main sector of employment in the world’s poorest regions. Two-thirds of workers in sub-Saharan Africa and almost half of workers in South Asia and South-East Asia & the Pacific are in agriculture. *Jason Berkes* *www.jasonberkes.com* Tags: agriculture, farming, jason berkes