Imo State Retains Top Spot As Nigeria’s Unemployment Capital- NBS

Imo State has again retained its position as the country’s unemployment capital with 50.64 per cent of its 4.93 million population unemployed as Nigeria’s unemployment rate rose to 33.3 per cent in 2020.

This was revealed in the latest labour force report for fourth quarter 2020 published by the National Bureau of Statistics on Monday.

NBS said, “In the case of unemployment by state, Imo State recorded the highest rate of unemployment with 56.64 per cent.”

Imo has a total population of 4.93 million as of 2017 and 50.64 per cent of the population shows that over 2.79 million people in the state are unemployed.

Adamawa State followed the South East state in terms of unemployment numbers with 54.89 per cent.

With a population of 3.17 million, Adamawa Sate has over 1.74 million of its population unemployed.

Cross Rivers State has 53.65 per cent of its population unemployed, representing 2 million of its 3.738 million people.

The States with the lowest rates were Osun, Benue and Zamfara States with 11.65 per cent, 11.98 per cent and 12.99 per cent respectively.

Benue recorded the worst case of underemployment with 43.52 per cent, followed by Zamfara and Jigawa States with 41.73 per cent and 41.29 per cent respectively.

Combining both unemployment and underemployment rates, 82.5 per cent of Imo State population are both unemployed and under employed. This was followed by Jigawa with 80 per cent.