Turkish employment policy works, minister says

GENEVA- Anatolia News Agency

Labor and Social Security Minister Çelik has addressed the ILO meeting in Geneva.

Turkey passed the test against the global financial crisis thanks to the macroeconomic policies and reforms of its government, Turkey’s Labor and Social Security Minister Faruk Çelik said yesterday at the 101 Session of the International Labor Organization (ILO).

As a result of these policies, unemployment in Turkey dropped to 9.1 percent in February. With this performance, Turkey ranked among the G-20 countries, which were able to reduce unemployment the quickest, Çelik said.

With a 9 percent growth in 2010 and 8.5 percent in 2011, Turkey was the fastest growing economy among the OECD countries and the second fastest among G-20 countries. “I want to underline the fact that we were successful in growth based on employment in Turkey,” Çelik said, adding that the country also successful in minimizing unregistered employment.

We made sure that those unemployed during the global crisis benefited from unemployment insurance, Çelik said.

Young affected by crisis

This year the conference contained a section on “Unemployment of Youth.” Young individuals were those most affected by the global crisis, Çelik said. In February 2012, we were able to bring the rate of unemployment among youth down to 18.3 percent. However, unemployment figures among youth are still higher than the average, Çelik said.

Çelik said public servants gained the right for collective bargaining after a constitutional amendment and a new law.

policy,