Turkey’s unemployment in single digits after 9 months

ISTANBUL - Doğan News Agency

DHA Photo

Turkey’s unemployment rate stood at 9.6 percent in the April period, falling to single digit levels after nine months, as the tourism sector began to employ seasonal employees, according to data released by the Turkish Statistical Institute (TÜİK) on July 15.

Employment in the services sector increased by 1.2 percentage points, driven by tourism, while employment in agriculture fell by 0.6 percentage points, in industry by 0.5 percentage points and in construction by 0.1 percentage point compared to the same period of the previous year.

The non-agricultural unemployment rate fell to 11.6 percent in the same period, 0.8 percentage points higher than a year before and 1 percentage point lower than the previous month.

The youth unemployment rate, including the 15-24 age group, was 17 percent with a 1.5 percentage point increase, while the unemployment rate for the 15-64 age group was 9.8 percent, a 0.7 percentage point increase, against the same period of last year.

The number of unemployed persons aged 15 years old and over became 2.8 million persons, a 242, 000 increase over the period of April 2015 in Turkey compared to the same period of the previous year.

Agricultural employment decreased by 67,000 persons and non-agricultural employment increased by 511,000 persons in this period.

Of those who were employed in this period; 20.7 percent were employed in agriculture, 20 percent were employed in industry, 7.2 percent were employed in construction and 52.1 percent were employed in services.

Labor force participation rate rose to 51.1 percent, a 0.4 percentage point increase, including 71.2 percent for males and 31.4 percent for females.