All-India Quarterly Establishment Based Employment Survey – UPSC Prelims

All-India Quarterly Establishment Based Employment Survey (AQEES):
  • Released by: Labour Bureau, Ministry of Labour and Employment
  • Purpose: To provide frequent (quarterly) updates about the employment and related variables of establishments, in both organised and unorganised segments, of nine selected sectors. These sectors altogether account for a majority of the total employment in the non-farm establishments.
  • Nine Selected Sectors: Manufacturing, Construction, Trade, Transport, Education, Health, Accommodation and Restaurant, IT/ BPO and Financial Services.
  • Components: There are two components under AQEES:
    • Quarterly Employment Survey(QES): It compiles relevant data from about 12,000 establishments selected through a sampling design to represent each of the nine sectors within each state/ Union Territory, as also each size-class (range of the number of workers) within each sector-State/ UT.
    • Area Frame Establishment Survey (AFES): It covers the unorganised segment (with less than 10 workers) through a sample survey.
Key highlights of QES 2021:
  • It shows a 29% increase in employment in nine sectors during the peak Covid-19 months of April-June 2021 over a base of 2013-14 (Sixth Economic Census).
  • The most impressive growth of 152% has been recorded in the IT/BPO sector.
  • Nearly 90% of the establishments have been estimated to work with less than 100 workers.
  • There has been a decline in the share of female workers. From 31% in the 6th EC (2013) to 29% in QES (2021) data.
  • Out of the 9 sectors, 7 sectors saw growth in employment while only 2 sectors (Trade, and Accommodation & Restaurants) saw a decline in employment figures.
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