Although economic prospects may be improving, employment opportunities are growing more slowly than the potential labour force is expanding. The age structure of Fiji's population is changing in a significant way. A growing proportion of the population is in the economically active age-group, aged between 15 and 64 years. Over the next decade, therefore, the demand for school places and other services for children is likely to stabilize while the number of young people seeking jobs will increase quite quickly. As people move out of subsistence production and as more young people pass through secondary school, the number of job-seekers swells.
Women constitute the fastest growing group of job-seekers.
Every year around 9,000 school leavers enter the labour market of whom only 2,000 are absorbed into paid employment. Some of the remainder are absorbed in tertiary institutions or informal employment but many join the growing pool of unemployed. The problem of unemployment, the growing imbalance in income distribution, and the pressure on Government to provide social services in the face of sluggish economic growth have generated considerable discussion of ways to increase investment and develop new avenues of growth.