Led by the expansion of the South Korean pharmaceutical industry, the size of the local pharma workforce grew by 27 percent compared to four years ago, recent data showed Monday.

According to the Korea Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association, a total of 94,500 people were employed at some 842 pharmaceutical companies as of 2015, a sharp increase from 2011, when 74,000 people were employed at 822 companies. 


While the number of pharmaceutical companies rose just 2 percent during the four-year period, the number of people employed in the field rose 27 percent, the association said.

“Despite deepening unemployment, Korea’s pharmaceutical industry appears to be actively contributing to continued job creation,” the KPMA said in a statement.

The biggest growth came from the drug manufacturing and research and development arenas. The number of manufacturing personnel rose 34 percent from 23,500 in 2011 to 31,700 in 2015. The number of R&D personnel grew 26 percent from 8,800 to 11,000 during the four-year time frame.

Meanwhile, the change in the size of the pharmaceutical sales and marketing workforce was smaller but still significant — growing from 24,500 people in 2011 to 25,700 people in 2015, according to the association.

Taken as a whole, manufacturing personnel took up the biggest share of the pharmaceutical workforce in 2015 at 33.5 percent, followed by sales and marketing at 27.24 percent, administrative roles at 20.23 percent, R&D at 11.7 percent and others at 7.33 percent.

By Sohn Ji-young (jys@heraldcorp.com)