Dramatic turnaround in Geoscientist employment

In a survey conducted by the Australian Industry Group, employment results for the first quarter of 2010 have shown a dramatic turnaround in employment prospects for Australian geoscientists.

The level of geoscientist unemployment and underemployment in Australia, in the first three months of 2010 fell from 18.7% in December 2009 to 11.9% in March 2010.

Unemployment and underemployment in the mineral exploration sector fell from 21.1% to 10.6% in the corresponding period. This is the first survey in which exploration sector unemployment and underemployment has been lower than for the profession as a whole.

Geoscientist unemployment remained effectively constant at 4.6% (compared to 4.7% at the end of 2009) The unemployment rate for geoscientists in the mineral exploration sector fell from 8.7% at the end of 2009 to 4.4%, below the level of unemployment for the geoscience profession as a whole.

Confidence in regaining employment amongst unemployed or underemployed geoscientists in the next three months increased from 11.0% to 31.0%.

Geoscientists currently in employment also expressed improved confidence in retaining their positions in the longer term (more than 12 months) but expressed reservations in employment prospects over the next 6 months, pointing to continuing employment uncertainty and a lack of confidence in the apparent recovery in resource sector employment being sustained.

The structure of the geoscience workforce remains stable, with 77.3% of geoscientists in full time employment, 3.9% employed part time, and 18.6 percent working as self employed contractors and consultants.

Results do reflect the volatile nature of employment for the exploration sector. The geosciences profession in Australia went from a state of near full employment at the end of 2008 to 24.5% unemployment or under-employment by March 2009.

http://aig.org.au/policy-and-advocacy/latest-employment-survey-results.