Around 3,800 vacancies were advertised in construction, which was followed by manufacturing (over 3,700) and commerce (over 2,500), latest Statistics Office data show.

Meanwhile, the overall job vacancy rate decreased by 0.2 of a percentage point to 2.3% over the previous quarter and by 0.3 points over the second quarter in 2018.

This means that the number of job vacancies dropped by around 1,400 to slightly more than 18,500 from the January-to-March period.

Demand for new labour force decreased the most in manufacturing and trade, by around 300 job vacancies in each of them (-0.4 points).

On the other hand, the number of occupied posts has continued to rise ever since the second quarter of 2014, the figures released on Thursday show.

Around 772,100 posts were occupied in the second quarter, 5,700 more than in the first one. 81.5% of all occupied posts were at companies with 10 or more workers.

The number of occupied posts increased the most in construction (+1,500) and trade (+1,000).