Nearly 60 percent of big companies in South Korea have either not yet established a recruitment plan for the second half of the year or do not plan to hire at all, a poll showed Thursday.

According to the survey carried out by polling agency Research & Research on the country's top 500 companies by sales from Aug. 5-19, 57.5 percent of responding firms said they have yet to come up with recruitment plans or don't plan to hire new college graduates during the remainder of the year.

In the poll commissioned by the Federation of Korean Industries, 40 percent stated that they had not yet established a recruitment plan, and 17.5 percent said they had no plans to hire.

On the other hand, 42.5 percent responded that they had established recruitment plans for the second half, marking a 7.1 percentage-point increase from last year's survey for the same period.

When asked about the reasons for not hiring, 23.8 percent cited tightened management in response to economic uncertainty, followed by the prolonged economic downturn at 20.6 percent and difficulty in securing talent at 17.5 percent.

A federation official said companies are expected to take a conservative approach to hiring, given concerns over the economic slowdown and sluggish domestic demand.

The official also emphasized the need to avoid legislative discussions that increase uncertainty in corporate management and called for the relaxation of various corporate regulations. (Yonhap)