Turkey’s unemployment rate falls to 10.1 pct in March

ANKARA

Turkey’s unemployment rate stood at 10.1 percent in March, falling 1.6 percentage points on a yearly basis, but it remained in double digits, official data has shown.

The unemployment rate was 10.6 percent in February.

The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 9.9 percent in March with a 0.1 percentage point increase, according to data from the Turkish Statistics Institute (TÜİK), which was released on June 18.

In the same period, the non-agricultural unemployment rate occurred as 11.9 percent with a 1.8 percentage point decrease, TÜİK said.

The number of unemployed persons aged 15 and over—3.2 million last March—decreased 432,000 year-on-year.

“While the youth unemployment rate including persons aged 15-24 was 17.7 percent with a 3.7 percentage point decrease, the unemployment rate for persons aged 15-64 occurred as 10.3 percent with a 1.7 percentage point decrease,” it added.

The number of employed people rose by 1 million to nearly 10.3 million in the same period, pushing the employment rate up to 47.1 percent with a 1 percentage point annual increase, the institute added.

Breaking down employment by sector, 17.7 percent of people are employed in agriculture, 19.7 percent in industry, 7.3 percent in construction, and 55.3 percent in services, according to TÜİK data.

Official data showed that the labor force participation rate (LFPR) was 52.4 percent—a 0.2-percentage point increase year-on-year—while the number of people in the labor force reached 31.7 million—up 578,000.

The male LFPR stood at 71.8 percent—down 0.1 percentage point—while the female rate was 33.4 percent—up 0.5 percentage points on a yearly basis.

Meanwhile, the rate of unregistered employment—people working without social security related to their principal occupation—stood at 32.4 percent, a drop of 0.7 percentage points year-on-year, TÜİK added.