BERLIN (Reuters) -Employment in Germany's struggling automotive sector is at its lowest level in more than a decade following the elimination of tens of thousands of jobs, said the federal statistics office.
The automotive industry, including parts makers, recorded 721,400 employees at the end of September, the smallest figure since 718,000 in mid-2011, according to data from the office published on Thursday.
As of the end of September, the sector had 48,700 fewer staff than a year earlier, a fall
of 6.3% and the biggest drop in any major industrial sector with over 200,000 staff, it said.
By comparison, the manufacturing sector as a whole employed around 5.43 million people at the end of September. This was 120,300, or 2.2%, fewer than a year earlier, said the office.
"The prolonged recession in industry is clearly reflected in employment trends," said Cyrus de la Rubia, chief economist at Hamburg Commercial Bank.
Nevertheless, the car industry remains Germany's second-largest manufacturing sector in terms of employment, after mechanical engineering, which counts around 934,200 people as staff.
German manufacturers are struggling with high U.S. tariffs, the rise of Chinese electric vehicle makers and, most recently, chip supply difficulties due to a dispute over Nexperia.
Nevertheless, the mood in the German automotive industry improved noticeably in October, according to a survey by the Ifo economic institute earlier this month. The sector's business climate index rose to minus 12.9 points from minus 21.3 points in September, it found.
(Reporting by Rene Wagner, Writing by Miranda MurrayEditing by Ludwig Burger)
