IRMA study finds increasing demand for people with higher education

Updated on: Thursday, November 29, 2012

The demand for higher education is increasing rapidly in certain occupations, where mostly non graduates worked a decade ago, says a study on education and employment by Institute of Rural Management Anand (IRMA).

Traditionally, low graduate intensity occupations such as merchants, shopkeepers, salesmen and workers in the field of chemical processors, rubber, paper and plastic products, farm plantation and metal processors actually saw a rise in graduate density and demand for graduates.

The study, 'Education and Employment: Do the education level/skills of our youth match relevant jobs?' by Jeemol Unni, director, IRMA and Sudipa Sarkar, research associate, IRMA, finds out that there was a rapid rise in the number of jobs for occupations that required higher qualifications such as professional, technical, administrative and clerical since 1999-2000.

Medium graduate intensity occupations like associate professionals, technicians, health professionals, clerks, technical salesmen, village officials, artists and composers, transport conductors and primary and middle school teachers, also saw a need for better qualified personnel as these jobs were being upgraded with the advent of knowledge economy in India.

The very high graduate intensity occupations such as solicitors, medical practitioners, higher education and secondary teachers, architects, engineers, accountants, auditors, mathematicians, senior administrators, directors, managerial executives, IT professionals and even poets, authors and journalists retained their need for higher educated workers.

Among the graduate occupation categories, 3% were in high graduate intensity, 13% were in medium intensity and about 11% were in the low intensity occupations. It was the medium graduate intensity occupations that registered the largest (10%) increase in employed population over the decade.

The study also shows that the services industry sought graduates more than the manufacturing sector. In manufacturing, all industry groups had shown less than 2.5% annual growth of employment. About 7.2% growth was registered in high technology knowledge intensive service industries like telecom, computer services and research and technology.

"Having a graduate degree made a greater impact overall on participation in service industry compared to manufacturing sector. Senior managerial officials and professionals with graduate and higher degrees had a greater chance of being employed in knowledge intensive industry, mainly services," says the study.

IRMA study finds increasing demand for people with higher education

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