Berlin, Jan 5 (IANS): The coronavirus crisis in 2020 ended a 14-year streak of job growth in Germany, which also continued during the global economic and financial crisis, the country's Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) said.

The number of people in employment with place of work in Germany decreased by 1.1 per cent year-on-year to around 44.8 million people, Xinhua news agency quoted Destatis as saying in a statement on Monday.

"Employment in Germany fell for the first time since 2005," Holger Schaefer, senior economist for employment and unemployment at the German Economic Institute (IW), told Xinhua on Monday.

"At the same time, this was the sharpest decline since 1993," he added.

In Germany's service sector, the number of employees in 2020 fell by 2 per cent in trade, transport and hospitality and by 2.5 per cent in business services, including labour leasing, according to Destatis.

Meanwhile, employment in public services, education and health in Germany increased by 1.4 per cent, it said.

In industry, the number of people in employment declined by 2.3 per cent to around 8.2 million in 2020.

The construction industry continued to provide "positive contributions" to the country's labour market with an increase of 0.7 per cent to around 2.6 million people in employment.

The overall development in employment in Germany last year was "almost entirely driven by the coronavirus pandemic despite a previously emerging recession", said Schaefer.

As shown by the unemployment figures, which only increased slightly, the labour market in Germany remained stable.