Big Korean Firms to Cut New Hirings: Poll

Job hunters in South Korea are expected to find slim pickings this year as big companies plan to

hire less staff than a year earlier, a survey showed Thursday.

Demand for new jobs in 286 big companies in terms of revenue, including Samsung Electronics Co. and Hyundai Motor Co., will fall 6.3 percent to 24,756 positions in 2008, according to the survey

by the Federation of Korean Industries.

The tight job market comes as South Korea's once-rapid growth rate has slipped for years with technology and manufacturing sectors failing to produce more jobs, the nation's top business lobby group said in a statement.

On Wednesday, the Bank of Korea kept its overnight call rate unchanged at five percent for the sixth straight month amid growing risk of a global economic slowdown.

President-elect Lee Myung-bak, who will take office on Feb. 25, is counting on a pickup in corporate spending to help meet his economic growth forecast of six percent this year.

However, many research agencies, including the central bank, have been conservative over the nation's growth outlook this year. The Bank of Korea recently projected a growth rate of 4.7 percent for 2008.