Grads face tough employment market in Q2

Employment prospects for Chinese graduates remained challenging in the second quarter, as more college students postpone job seeking due to the COVID-19 crisis, a report said.

The China Institute for Employment Research's index for college students dropped from 1.38 to 0.95 quarter on quarter, according to research by the institute under Renmin University of China and job-hunting website Zhaopin.com.

An index reading above 1.0 means job supply outweighs demand, while below 1.0 signals the opposite.

Corporate recruitment demand and the number of fresh graduate applicants both picked up in the latest quarter, but growth of job-seekers outpaced the number of vacancies, making competition tougher.

Due to the impact of the epidemic at the beginning of the year, the "golden period" of job hunting for graduates has also been postponed from spring to summer.

Meanwhile, traditional campus recruitment activities have moved online, which led to a significant increase in the number of online job applicants from April to June, the study noted.

The new infrastructure sector had a large demand for talent during the period, while competition in finance and legal fields was fierce.