February unemployment falls to 13.6 pct

Unemployment in Turkey dropped to 13.6 percent this February, down 1.1 percentage points from the same month last year, the Turkish Statistical Institute (TÜİK) announced on May 11.

The number of unemployed persons age 15 and overslipped by 502,000 year-on-year to 4.23 million by the end of February.

On a monthly basis, February's figure also dropped 0.2 percentage points, as unemployment in January stood at 13.8 percent.

Official data also showed that non-agricultural unemployment fell 1.5 percentage points to 15.4 percent during the same period.

The youth unemployment rate, including people age 15-24, was 24.4 percent in February, down 1.7 percentage points on a yearly basis.

In February, employment posted a decrease of 1.7 percentage points from the same month last year, down to 43.1 percent.

"The number of employed persons decreased by 602,000 to 26.8 million persons in February 2020 period, compared with the same period of the previous year," TÜİK said.

The labor force participation rate also went down by 2.6 percentage points year-on-year, falling to 49.9 percent in the month.

The labor force participation rate for males dropped 2.4 percentage points to 69 percent, and for females it was 31.2 percent, an annual decline of 2.8 percentage points.

TÜİK also reported that the rate of unregistered employment - people working without social security related to their principal occupation was 30 percent in February, marking a 3.5-percentage point decrease from February 2019.

The institute will release its next monthly employment figures on June 10.

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