Japan’s unemployment rate unexpectedly fell in February and the number of available jobs rose to the highest level in two years, evidence that the economy was rebounding before the March 11 earthquake.

The jobless rate slid to 4.6 percent from the previous month’s 4.9 percent, the statistics bureau said today in Tokyo. The median estimate of 24 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News was for the rate to be unchanged.

The report bolsters the view that Japan was recovering from a fourth-quarter contraction before the record earthquake caused companies to suspend production amid power shortages. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. today said the economy will shrink next quarter and lowered its growth forecast for the year starting April 1 to 0.7 percent from 1.3 percent.

“We look for employment indicators to continue showing gradual improvements in the months ahead, but believe there could be some temporary fluctuations due to the impact of the earthquake,” Kyohei Morita, Tokyo-based chief economist at Barclays Capital, said before the data was released.

The economy added 370,000 jobs in February, the third monthly increase, today’s report showed. The seasonally adjusted figures show more people also returned to the labor force.

Household spending fell 0.2 percent after a 1 percent decline in January, the statistics bureau said. Retail sales rose 0.1 percent from a year earlier, beating economists’ forecasts for a 0.5 percent drop, the Trade Ministry said in a separate report today.

The job-to-applicant ratio rose to 0.62, indicating there were 62 positions for every 100 candidates in February, the highest since January 2009, the Labor Ministry said.

Today’s jobless figures don’t include data from Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima prefectures, where data collection was disrupted by the magnitude-9.0 earthquake that struck the Tohoku region, the statistics bureau said.