Support Services Labour Market Dynamics

 Industry dataset (economic indicators and labour market dynamics)  

Source: Linked Employer-Employee Data, Stats NZ¹

Linked Employer-Employee Data (LEED) data is produced by Stats New Zealand quarterly to measure labour market dynamics. There is a lag in data availability of around 14 months due to the time it takes for the data to be completed by employers, to flow through Inland Revenue, and for Stats NZ to undertake relevant transformations and quality checks². Here, we show the most recent data available at the time of publishing.

LEED data is available at the ANZSIC ‘group’ level, which is a broader level of classification than the ANZSIC class codes used for the workforce estimates. The relevant ANZSIC groups here are 052 Agriculture and Fishing Support Services³, 042 Hunting and Trapping⁴, and 331 Agricultural Product Wholesaling⁵.

Agriculture and Fishing Support Services includes 0521 Cotton Ginning, 0522 Shearing Services, and 0529 Other Agriculture and Fishing Support Services. Agricultural Product Wholesaling includes 3311 Wool Wholesaling, 3312 Cereal Grain Wholesaling, and 3319 Other Agricultural Product Wholesaling. Hunting and Trapping includes businesses engaged in hunting, trapping, or taking animals, birds, or reptiles in the wild for commercial, population control or pest control purposes.

Median Earnings

The quarterly median earnings for the Hunting and Trapping industry have remained stable, resulting in a widening gap in earnings compared to other industries. The Agricultural Product Wholesaling industry consistently had higher median earnings than that of all industries.

In the chart, we provide two benchmarks for reference: ‘agriculture, forestry and fishing’ which covers all industries involved in growing crops, raising animals, growing and harvesting timber, and harvesting fish and other animals from farms or their natural habitats, and a benchmark for ‘all industries’ which includes every industry group in New Zealand.

Quarterly Turnover Rate

The quarterly worker turnover rate for the Agriculture and Fishing Support Services industry has remained high, despite reductions in the worker turnover rate starting in 2020. The rate is still double the average across all industries in New Zealand and is higher than the rate across ‘agriculture, forestry and fishing’ industries more broadly.

The worker turnover rate for the Agricultural Product Wholesaling industry is similar to the average across all New Zealand industries, but there were strong peaks in worker turnover in March and June in 2016, 2018 and 2021. The worker turnover rate for the Hunting and Trapping industry is volatile, likely due to the smaller workforce.

In the chart, we provide two benchmarks for reference: ‘agriculture, forestry and fishing’ which covers all industries involved in growing crops, raising animals, growing and harvesting timber, and harvesting fish and other animals from farms or their natural habitats, and a benchmark for ‘all industries’ which includes every industry group in New Zealand.

Number of Filled Jobs

The number of filled jobs is an indicator of economic activity. Overall, there was an increase in the total number of filled jobs in the Agriculture and Fishing Support Services industry allowing for seasonal cycles. There was a downward trend in the number of filled jobs in Hunting and Trapping between 2015 and 2018 and plateauing thereafter (view this detail by filtering to this industry on the graph) before increasing back to 2015 levels (110 jobs) at the end of 2021. The total number of filled jobs in Agricultural Product Wholesaling was fairly stable between 2015 and 2021, but increased during the December 2021 quarter and has remained high.