Turkey’s unemployment rate on the rise
Posted by meb at February 16th, 2008
Turkey’s unemployment rate rose to 10.1 percent in the three months through December, from 9.6 percent in the same period a year earlier, according to data published by the Turkish Statistical Institute (TÜİK) Friday.
It is the fourth consecutive increase as economic growth slows, reported Bloomberg. Unemployment was forecast at 9.9 percent in the period, according to the median estimate of five economists surveyed by Bloomberg. The jobless rate was 9.7 percent a month earlier.
Economic growth eased to 1.5 percent in the third quarter, the slowest since 2001, from 4.1 percent in the previous three months as interest rate increases from 2006 curbed consumer demand and drought hit farm production.
Unemployment higher in urban areas
Turkey’s non-institutional working age civilian population increased by 740,000 to 49.51 million in November 2007 compared to the same period of the previous year, according to TÜİK Household Labor Force Survey. The non-institutional civilian population increased by 759,000 persons to 69.18 million persons over the period.
Number of employed persons declined by 368,000 persons compared to the same period of the previous year and reached to 20,86 million persons in November 2007. Agricultural employment dropped by 349,000 persons and non-agricultural employment declined by 19,000 persons in this period.
Of those who were employed in November 2007, 25 percent was employed in agriculture, 20.6 percent in industry, 6 percent in construction and 48.4 percent in services. Employment in agriculture declined by 1.2 and construction decreased by 0.1 percentage points while employment in industry rose by 0.1 and in services by 1.2.
The number of unemployed persons in Turkey increased by 85,000 persons compared to the same period of the previous year and reached to 2.35 million persons. Unemployment rate was 10.1 percent with 0.5 points increase. Unemployment rate rose to 12 percent with a 0.3 percentage points increase in urban areas and to 7.1 percent with 0.6 percentage points increase in rural areas.
Non-agricultural unemployment rate rose to 12.6 percent with 0.4 percentage points increase compared to the same period of the previous year. Total public sector employment was 2,92 million persons in the fourth quarter in 2007, according to The Ministry of Finance’s data.
The ratio of persons who worked without any social security related to the main job declined to 45.4 percent. The share of persons who did not have any social security in agriculture decreased from 87.8 percent to 87 percent and that in non-agriculture declined from 33.9 percent to 31.6 percent compared to the same period of the previous year.
Source: Turkish Daily News
Related posts:
