Nanaimo's economy appears to be keeping pace with the rest of the province, but the city and surrounding region has seen a shift away from employment in the manufacturing sector to other sectors, a new report shows.

The Nanaimo Economic Development Corporation released its 2014 economic indicators report this week, giving an overview of trends in employment, the labour force education, business investment and other areas of concern. It shows 910 jobs were lost in the goods producing sector, while 1,535 jobs were gained in the services sector since the last federal census.

While employment in manufacturing is down, employment from health care, education, public administration, accommodation and food services saw increased activity.

The report also shows that employment in the region has grown on average by one per cent a year from 2009 to 2013, ranking the city second overall among four other similarly-sized cities: Kelowna, Kamloops, Prince George and Chilliwack. Unemployment in the city ticked up to 5.5 per cent in 2013 compared to fiver per cent in 2012, but overall remained 1.1 per cent lower than the rest of the province and also ended last year with the second lowest unemployment rate among the four similar-sized cities.

Nanaimo's gross domestic product - the sum value of goods and services in the city - reached $3.9 billion by the end of last year and represents a slowly growing portion of the B.C. economy at 2.1 per cent. The city's GDP has increased six per cent since 2009.
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