Australia's job unemployment rate has improved in July, inching up to 5.2 per cent from 5.3 per cent in June, defying analysts' projections of 5.4 per cent. The improvement corresponded to a total of 14,000 new jobs in July, versus projections of 10,000.

Although the numbers were favourable, however, any potential developments in the coming months could be threatened by the continued upward movement of the Australian dollar.

From $1.0568 before the data were released, the Australian dollar bought $1.0581 at 11:37 a.m. in Sydney.

"You'll get some softer employment gains in the next six months or so as you see industries affected by the Aussie dollar going up and global (economic) weakness," Stephen Walters, chief economist of JP Morgan Australia, told news portal www.skynews.com.au, noting a sustained improvement in the remainder of 2012 could be farfetched.

"That affects the investment pipeline and also those tourism and retail jobs."

"The partial rebound in jobs is payback for the larger than expected drop in June," economist Katrina Ell said in Bloomberg News.

Of the 14,000 new jobs, 9,200 were fulltime. Almost half the new jobs were located in Queensland.

Australia's participation rate, a measure of the labour force linked in proportion to the population, fell in July to 65.2 per cent from a revised 65.3 per cent in June.

"It's going to be very gradual on the jobless front. We don't expect any spikes in the unemployment rate, it'll be running at that 5.2 per cent, 5.3 per cent level," Mr Walters said.

Economist Savanth Sebastian from CommSec seconded Mr Walters' observations.

"I don't think the labour market's shooting the lights out, if anything it's probably going sideways," he said. "It suggests that as activity levels pick up towards the end of the year, we should see employers once again start hiring,"

The world's fifth-most traded currency had grown 2.6 per cent in July after increasing 5.2 per cent in June.

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