Turkey's jobless rate down to 10.8 percent

ANKARA (A.A) - June 15, 2011 - Turkey's jobless rate dropped to 10.8 percent to 2,816,000 year-on-year in March 2011.
Turkey's statistics authority, TurkStat, made public the results of a household labor force survey for March 2011 on Wednesday.
The authority said Turkey's jobless rate decreased by 2.9 points to 10.8 percent in March 2011 compared to the same month of 2010. Jobless rate was 13.7 percent in March 2010.
TurkStat also announced that the unemployed population in the country dropped to 2,816,000 in March, as the number of the employed rose to 23,286,000.
The institution said non-agricultural jobless rate was 13.4 percent while youth unemployment stood at 19.3 percent.
The following chart shows basic seasonally unadjusted employment figures for March 2010 and 2011:


.                                       2010/Mar        2011/Mar
.                                     -------------  -------------
POPULATION (thousand)                     71,105         72,014
Population at age 15& above(thousand)     52,287         53,242
WORK FORCE (thousand)                     25,179         26,103
.Employment (thousand)                    21,741         23,286
.Jobless (thousand)                        3,438          2,816
Participation in work force (%)             48.2           49.0 
Employment rate (%)                         41.6           43.7 
Unemployment rate (%)                       13.7           10.8 
Non-agricultural unemployment (%)           16.7           13.4 
Youth unemployment (%)                      24.6           19.3 
Out of work force (thousand)              27,108         27,139