UAE's banking and finance sectors are hiring again

Spurred by positive business sentiments, hiring in the UAE and the Middle East has gone up this year over 2010. There are sectors that are more bullish and are hiring in healthy numbers, according to experts.

“Industries that are attracting/retaining the top talent in the UAE [are] banking and finance,” Lama Ataya, Chief Marketing Officer at Bayt.com told Emirates 24|7.

“[Banking and Finance] ranked first with 41 per cent of votes, according to [our] recent Middle East Job Index Survey, followed by construction (32 per cent), oil, gas and petrochemicals (31 per cent), telecommunications (30 per cent), and tourism and hospitality (26 per cent). Medical/health services was at 17 per cent, electronics (18 per cent), IT (20 per cent), advertising and consumer goods (23 per cent) turned out to be the industries that least attract or retain top talents in the UAE,” she added.

As per the latest Monster Employment Index Middle East, online opportunities in April exceeded the November (2010) level in six of the 12 industries it monitored.

Production/manufacturing, automotive and ancillary (up 12 per cent) was among the leading sectors in the index in terms of six-month growth rate in April. On the other hand, retail/trade and logistics (down 31 per cent) charted the most dramatic downswing in recruitment activity between November 2010 and April 2011 among all sectors, said the index.

The index also shows that online demand for workers exceeded the November level of last year in five of the 11 occupational categories monitored.

Marketing & communications/arts/creative (up 36 per cent) recorded the sturdiest six-month growth among occupation groups. Software, hardware, telecom (up one percent) registered positive growth in April marking the most dramatic improvement in trend among groups (up from -15 percent in March to 1 per cent in April). Engineering and production (down five per cent) reached the lowest in the series since October 2010, the index stated.

According to jobs posted on Gulf Talent.com, engineering - civil & construction, showed the maximum number of listings. Another popular job portal, Naukrigulf.com shows construction /civil engineering and oil & gas with maximum job openings.

However, there are some experts who believe it is difficult to look at this issue in terms of narrow segments as driving job creation is more complex.

“It is difficult to identify key sectors. Our recent placements have been with a wide variety of industry sectors ranging from logistics and FMCG to financial services and industrial chemicals,” Cliff Single, Commercial Manager at BAC Middle East told this website.

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