A second recession in Europe would not have as significant an impact on employment prospects in South Africa that the economic downturn had three years ago, business leaders have claimed.

Business Live reports that economists speaking at the Bureau of Economic Research (BER) conference said that while the immediate future regarding the eurozone looks uncertain, the effects on jobs will be less severe than previously.

Hugo Pienaar, BER senior economist, said that there is not much room for manoeuvre in South Africa should the eurozone crisis worsen, as interest rates are already close to zero and firms cannot make many more cuts.

Haroon Bhorat, a professor at the University of Cape Town School of Economics, echoed this sentiment, stating: "Most of the company culling has already happened when we lost one million jobs. In a sense we are already at the bottom."

The National Association of Automobile Manufacturers of SA showed that job creation in the industry expanded in the third quarter.

Posted by Lee Thrace