Despite unemployment some firms struggling to hire people

ISTANBUL

At a time when Turkey’s unemployment rate is hovering above 11 percent, there are 107,000 vacant positions that need to be filled, of which around 20,000 are blue-collar jobs.

The latest official data from the Turkish Statistical Institute (TÜİK) showed that the unemployment rate climbed to 11.5 percent in March. The number of jobless people increased by 153,000 from a month ago to 3.95 million.

However, the employment agency, İŞKUR, reported that there were 3.58 million registered unemployed people in the country in April, down 1.4 percent from the previous month. Some 51 percent of the unemployed were men, 49 percent were women and 34 percent of them were those aged between 15 and 24.

İŞKUR also unveiled the vacant jobs data. Businesses from all provinces apply to İŞKUR to find people to hire, specifying the qualifications they seek, such as education and experience. İŞKUR mediates between job seekers and businesses.

In April alone, İŞKUR received more than 20,000 applications from businesses, while since the start of the year, it received 705,000 applications, of which 98 percent came from the private sector. Between January and April, most of the applications were filed by manufacturing companies.

In the first four months of this year, some 464,000 people, including 139,000 in April, found a job through İŞKUR, which meant 65 percent of the companies succeeded in finding employees who met their requirements.

According to the latest data from the employment agency, companies are currently looking for 107,000 personnel. Businesses are seeking 20,000 laborers. Sales representatives came second with 5,000 on the most sought-after list. Companies operating in the tourism industry are also looking for around 5,000 people to hire as the busy tourism season nears.

Data show that businesses face problems finding semi-skilled workers. Those are the people who are trained at vocational schools.

In the manufacturing industry, starting salaries of semi-skilled workers vary between 5,000 and 7,000 liras, whereas the net minimum wage in Turkey is 4,250 liras. Due to the shortage of semi-skilled workers, businesses hire university graduates and get them trained under the expertise of a supervisor.

Training takes time, and some of the new recruits quit the job, with most of them finding the salary they receive as an apprentice too low for a university graduate.