Major firms will begin hiring university graduates year-round, Keidanren said Monday, revamping Japan's long-standing education-to-employment pathway in response to the changing labor market.

Keidanren, the country's most powerful business lobby and also known as the Japan Business Federation, will no longer expect its members to adhere to the custom in which job offers are made to college seniors in October and they go to work the following April.

After consulting with universities, the lobby announced the policy in an interim report.