Nigeria’s Unemployment Rate Rises To 27.1% – NBS

Nigeria’s unemployment rate has hit a record 27.1 percent in the second quarter of this year, the National Bureau of Statistics has said.

The NBS said this in the Labour Force Statistics published on Friday.

The report comes almost wo years after the body published the last official labour force report in the third quarter of 2019 where the rate was said to have increased from 18.8 per cent in the third quarter of 2017 to 23.1 per cent in the third quarter of 2018.

The Nigeria Employers’ Consultative Association had in November last year warned that the rate of unemployment in Nigeria may rise to 33.5 per cent.

In the unemployment rate report, the NBS said, “The unemployment rate during the reference period, Q2, 2020 was 27.1 per cent, up from the 23.1 per cent recorded in Q3, 2018. The underemployment rate increased from 20.1 per cent in Q3, 2018 to 28.6 per cent.”

The Bureau added that for the second quarter of this year, the unemployment rate among young people (15-34years) was 34.9 per cent, up from 29.7 per cent.

Also, it said that the rate of underemployment for the same age group rose to 28.2 per cent from 25.7 per cent in the third quarter of 2018.

The number of persons in the economically active or working age population (15 – 64 years of age) during the second quarter of 2020 was 116,871,186.

The NBS put the number of persons in the labour force which are people within ages 15 -64, who are able and willing to work at 80,291,894.