Industrial production shrinks, jobless rate declines in April

ANKARA

Türkiye’s industrial production declined on an annual basis, but the unemployment rate dropped in April, separate data have shown.

The country’s industrial output fell 0.7 percent in April from a year ago after rising 4.6 percent year-on-year in the previous month, the Turkish Statistical Institute (TÜİK) said on June 10.

On a monthly basis, production, which was down 0.1 percent in March, plunged 4.9 percent.

In the manufacturing sector, output declined 1.5 percent year-on-year and 5.3 percent month-on-month, according to TÜİK.

The latest PMI showed that manufacturing activity remained weak in May. The headline PMI in the manufacturing sector posted below the 50 no-change mark for the second consecutive month in May, dropping to 48.4 from 49.3 in April.

Any figure greater than 50 indicates overall improvement in the sector.

Manufacturing firms reported a solid moderation of new orders, with the pace of easing the most pronounced since January, according to the PMI survey by S&P Global.

The numbers of TÜİK on June 10 showed that production in the intermediate goods sector increased by 1.2 percent annually in April but contracted 4 percent from the previous month.

Companies operating in the durable consumer goods sector increased their production by 2.8 percent compared with April last year, however, their output fell 1.6 percent from March. In the non-durable goods sector, production fell 3.5 percent year-on-year.

Production in the energy sector surged 7 percent annually, but output in the capital goods manufacturing sector plunged 5.8 percent.

 Jobless rate falls

Separate data TÜİK released on June 10 showed that Türkiye’s unemployment rate declined slightly from 8.6 percent in March to 8.5 percent in April.

The number of unemployed people fell by 17,000 from March to April to a little more than 3 million.

The unemployment rate among men, which was 6.9 percent in March, rose to 7.2 percent, but it declined from 11.8 percent to 11.1 percent for women.

There were around 65.8 million people in Türkiye aged above 15, and the country’s total labor force was 35.66 million as of April, with 32.6 million people employed, according to TÜİK data.

The labor force participation rate remained unchanged from March to stand at 54.2, while the employment rate ticked down from 49.6 percent to 49.5 percent.

The unemployment rate among the country’s youth — aged between 15 and 24 — fell from 14.6 percent in February to 14.6 percent in March, said TÜİK.