Employment figures take a knock
Employment has decreased by 48 000 quarter-on-quarter, from 9 692 000 in December 2016 to 9 644 000 in March 2017.
According to Stats SA this was largely due to decreases in the trade, business services, community services, manufacturing and transport industries.
The electricity industry remained unchanged.
Stats SA says there were increases in construction and mining.
Employment decreased by 58 000 or -0.6% year-on-year between March 2017 and March 2016.
Efficient Group Economist Francois Stofberg says it was expected.
"This comes after the unemployment figures that was released a while back showing that unemployment is at a record high level of 27.7 percent, so we were expecting the fall in the employment figures," says Stofberg.
Stofberg says employers in the sectors hit hardest in the technical recession cannot employ the same numbers they were employing a few quarters ago.
"Businesses are struggling and sentiment and confidence is down. Usually it takes some time to get out of that slump."