The number of employers who intend to look for new staff in the next 6 months is increasing. This is indicated by the first 2022 study of employers' workforce needs of the Employment Agency, which was conducted in the period February - March of this year. The research is organized jointly with the Employment Commissions of the Regional Development Councils in the 28 regions of the country. It is nationally representative and was conducted through surveys among a statistical sample of employers representing 378,752 active enterprises in the country.

The results of the research show that 60,842 companies will be looking for new staff in the next 6 months. Compared to the survey in February-March 2021, their number increased by 2,620 or by 4.5%. Businesses require 239,339 workers and specialists with skills in various professional fields.

In the next 12 months, employers will be looking for 128,789 specialists with qualifications acquired in the system of secondary vocational education and vocational training. The most sought after will be waiter-bartender, cook, machine operator, tailor, builder, builder-installer, welder, operational accountant, electrician, cashier, etc.

Bulgarian business will need another 62,905 specialists with legal capacity or with higher education. Among them, drivers, nurses, teachers and doctors are most in demand.

70.7% of employers in the country face difficulties in securing personnel. Employers face the most serious difficulties in finding sales consultants, cooks, tailors, machine operators, programmers. By comparison, a year ago there were the greatest shortages of machine operators, operational accountants, teaching assistants, welders and electricians.

A new wave of COVID-19 will affect employers, Employment Agency research suggests. 19.4% of those who intended to hire will stop looking altogether, or 11,800 businesses. The strongest negative impact on the intention to hire new staff in a new pandemic will be felt in the trade, hotel and restaurant sectors, where 1/3 of the companies will give up looking for staff. However, 50.5% of them, or more than half, will not be affected by the appearance of a new COVID-19 wave - that's nearly 31,000 companies.

According to the study, in the medium term, ie. in the next 3 to 5 years, the demand for specialists with higher education will be 173,784 people. The three most sought-after professional fields will be Pedagogy, Economics and Electrical Engineering, Electronics and Automation. In the next 3 to 5 years, Bulgarian business will also need 208,964 specialists with secondary education. The most necessary will be the specialists in wholesale and retail trade, construction, production technologies - textiles, clothing, shoes and leather, mechanical engineering, metalworking and metallurgy, etc.

In 12 areas, employers said they would need more staff than a year earlier. These are the districts of Sofia-city, Varna, Dobrich, Sofia Region, Ruse and Pleven, etc. The weakest demand is in the region of Burgas, Plovdiv, Targovishte, Haskovo and Lovech, etc.

In the study, enterprises with different numbers are proportionally covered - from micro-enterprises with less than 10 employees to large enterprises with more than 250 employees. According to the economic activity, the largest share of surveyed enterprises from the "Trade, transport, hotel and restaurant" sector (34.3%), followed by the enterprises in the "Public administration, education, humanitarian healthcare" sector with 16.1% representation, and in third place is the "Industry" sector with 14.4%.

The labor force needs survey is conducted by the Employment Agency twice a year in order to collect and analyze up-to-date information on the professions, competencies, knowledge and skills of the personnel sought by employers and to plan measures to organize their professional training.

Source: https://www.az.government.bg