TREASURIES-Yields fall to 2013 lows on weaker job growth

* Slowest job growth in nine months casts shadow on U.S. growth prospects

* Fed accommodation expected to continue

NEW YORK, April 5 (Reuters) - U.S. Treasuries rallied on Friday, letting yields fall to their lowest levels of the year, after the government's report that U.S. employment grew at its slowest pace in nine months raised concern that U.S. growth could slow in coming months. The slower job growth surprised investors and persuaded them that the Federal Reserve would keep buying bonds to try to keep the economy on a growth path. "Today's report pushes out the date at which the Federal Reserve may reduce its purchases of securities," said Brian Jacobsen, chief portfolio strategist, Investments Group, at Wells Fargo Funds Management in Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin. The U.S. Labor Department said the U.S. economy produced just 88,000 new jobs last month. The unemployment rate edged lower, but that was mainly due to people leaving the workforce. The jobs news, combined with weaker global equity markets, the Bank of Japan's recently announced monetary stimulus program, and euro zone financial strains, encouraged investors to buy safe-haven bonds. "The economic data this week, ending with today's employment report, confirmed softness in the labor market," said Tanweer Akram, senior economist, global rates, fixed income at ING Investment Management in Atlanta. That, with resurgent global financial strains, supports the view of mainstream Federal Reserve policymakers that interest rates need to stay low for a long time and quantitative easing should be open-ended until a change is warranted, he said. As a result, "the market has been rallying and rates are much lower than what would have been expected," Akram said. Benchmark 10-year Treasury notes rose 22/32, letting their yields fall to 1.69 percent from 1.76 percent late Thursday and from 2.06 percent less than four weeks ago. The price of the 30-year Treasury bond rose more than two points; its yield fell to 2.86 percent, from 2.99 percent late on Thursday and 3.26 percent nearly four weeks ago. "Yields are returning to the lower levels where they should be," said Robert Tipp, chief investment strategist at Prudential Fixed Income in Newark, New Jersey, with more than $1 trillion in assets under management. Ten-year Treasury yields slipped below 2 percent in mid-March and have traded there ever since. But Friday's U.S. payrolls report was the impetus for yields to go even lower, said Daniel Heckman, senior fixed-income strategist at U.S. Bank Wealth Management in Minneapolis. "The report was a real punch in the stomach to the idea that the labor market was gaining traction," he said. "We saw some very disturbing data today." Still, Heckman said, near-term yields have fallen as low as they will go. "The bond market has gotten a little bit ahead of itself," he said. "I would not be chasing it at this point. Yields have built in quite a bit of economic weakness here." A test of the market's appetite for Treasuries at these new high prices and low yields comes next week when the Treasury will sell three-, 10- and 30-year government debt. "If demand at the Treasury auctions is weak, that could show investors have gotten a little too pessimistic on the economy and too bullish on the bond market," he said.