The number of full-time workers directly employed by Intelnear Rio Rancho fell by 37 percent in 2016 – from 1,900 salaried workers in 2015 to 1,200 as of December – according to the company’s latest annual report to the Sandoval County Commission.

Intel spokeswoman Liz Shipley told the Albuquerque Journal in an email that its head count is down from what it reported last spring in its 2015 report.

This is the sharpest annual decrease to date in direct, full-time employment at the plant since the company began laying off workers and reducing its head count through attrition in 2013. In that year, the Sandoval County plant employed 3,300 people, meaning its salaried workforce has fallen by nearly two thirds over the last four years.

The company still employs about 1,000 contract workers, about half of whom are generally on site daily to work on specific projects, Shipley said. But it’s not clear how many of those are full or part-time workers.

Intel announced in April 2016 that it planned to lay off about 12,000 people worldwide, or about 11 percent of its global workforce. That restructuring affected the Sandoval County site, according to the Intel report.

Sandoval County Commissioner Jay Block, who represents Corrales and Rio Rancho, said:  “It’s hard for people here to find high-paying jobs like those at Intel. That’s why this plant is so critical to our community.”

The plant still makes 32-nanometer chips, while Intel’s newer plants are producing 22- and 14-nanometer chips. It was apparently creating newer plants that Intel promised Trump that it would create.So on one hand it is creating jobs in one part of the country and in the other gutting them.

The company is now preparing to produce next-generation 10-nanometer chips, putting the Sandoval County plant far behind the curve. Intel has not given the plant any major upgrades since 2009, when the plant went from 45- to 32-nanometer technology.