The Canadian Press

Canada’s run at adding jobs continued last month, but the 17,900 gain reported on Friday disappointed expectations of a bigger pick-up.

The modest addition, all of them in the part-time category, wasn’t enough to budge the national unemployment rate from 8.2%.

Even more disappointing is that March saw a decline of 14,200 full-time jobs, which was counter-balanced by a 32,200-increase in part-time jobs.

The Canadian dollar, which had been trading overseas above US$1 just prior to the Statistics Canada report, dropped below parity again immediately afterwards.

Economists had been expecting 26,000 net new jobs in March after several strong employment reports earlier in the year.

In recent weeks, almost all of Canada’s major indicators have been positive.

Earlier this week, the Paris-based Organization of Economy Co-operation and Development, predicted Canada will lead other G7 countries in the recovery with a massive 6.2% growth rate in the first quarter of 2010.

March’s employment data did contain a sprinkling of strong news, including that the critical private sector added 42,400 jobs, and that all the net job gains were employees, rather than in the self-employment sector.

As well, Statistics Canada noted that the goods producing sector picked up 39,800 jobs during the month, with construction adding 21,000, and manufacturing and extraction also showing gains.

“Following significant losses (212,000) in manufacturing employment between October 2008 and June 2009, employment in this industry has stabilized, with March being the sixth consecutive month of little or no change,” Statistics Canada stated.

Still, the manufacturing sector remains down 286,000 workers since October 2008, when the recession hit Canada’s shores.

In March, most of the losses came in the services sector, with the notable exception of the 38,000 gain in the professional, scientific and technical services category. Other services, which included repair and maintenance and laundry services, were down 30,000, and losses also occurred in the business, building and other support services, and in transportation and warehousing.

Regionally, Ontario and Quebec were responsible for almost all the national increase in employment, adding 10,300 and 6,300 jobs respectively.