I

n a grim analysis issued on the eve of the G20 leaders summit, the International Labor Organization (ILO) says the global economy is on the verge of a new and deeper job recession that will further delay global economic recovery and may ignite more social unrest in many countries.

“We have reached the moment of truth. We have a brief window of opportunity to avoid a major double-dip in employment,” Raymond Torres, director of the ILO International Institute for Labor Studies, said in the World of Work Report 2011 released by ILO in Geneva on Monday.

According to the report, also titled “Making Markets Work for Jobs”, stalled global economic recovery has begun to dramatically affect labor markets, and with current trends it will take at least five years to return employment in advanced economies to pre-crisis levels, one year later than projected in last year’s report.

Noting that the current labor market is already within the confines of the usual six-month lag between an economic slowdown and its impact on employment, the report indicates that 80 million jobs need to be created over the next two years to return to pre-crisis employment levels.

However, the recent slowdown in growth suggests that the world economy is likely to create only half of the jobs needed, said Torres.

The report also features a new “social unrest” index that shows levels of discontent over the lack of jobs and anger over perceptions that the burden of the crisis was not shared fairly. It noted that in more than 45 of the 118 countries examined, the risk of social unrest was rising. This was especially the case in advanced economies, notably the EU, the Arab region and to a lesser extent Asia. By contrast, there was a stagnant or lower risk of social unrest in Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America.

The ILO study reveals that nearly two-thirds of advanced economies and half of emerging and developing economies with recent available data are once again experiencing a slowdown in employment. This comes on top of an already precarious employment situation in which global unemployment is at its highest point ever, surpassing 200 million worldwide.

The report cites three reasons why the ongoing economic slowdown might have a particularly strong impact on the employment panorama. It mentions that compared to the start of the crisis, enterprises are now in a weaker position to retain workers, governments are less inclined to maintain or adopt new job- and income-support programs and many countries have been left to act in isolation due to a lack of international policy coordination.

Torres said the ILO study also found that approximately 80 million new jobs would be needed over the next two years to re-attain pre-crisis employment rates.