Turkey’s Statistical Institute says unemployment exceeds 11 percent in August 2018

Based on data published by Turkey’s Statistical Institute, unemployment exceeded 11 percent in August 2018. The unemployment rate, which was 10.8 percent in July, rose by 0.5 percent to 11.1 percent in August. According to info provided by the institute, the number of unemployed above the age of 15 and older in Turkey reached the figure of 3 million 670 thousand in August 2018, with an increase of 266 thousand persons compared to the same period last year.

Unemployment rate increased by 0.5 points to 11.1 percent. During the same period, non-agricultural unemployment rate was estimated at 13.2 percent with 0.4 percentage points increase. Unemployment rate in the young population (15-24 years old) increased by 0.2 points to 20.8 percent, while in the 15-64 age group, this rate increased by 0.6 points to 11.4 percent.

In August 2018, the number of employed persons became 29 million 318 thousand with an increase of 490 thousand, compared to the same period of the previous year. The employment rate rose by 0.3 points to 48.3 percent.

In this period, while the number of employees in the agricultural sector decreased by 256 thousand, the number of employees in non-agricultural sectors increased by 745 thousand.

Of those employed, 19.4 percent were employed in agriculture, 19.5 percent in industry, 7.1 percent in construction and 54 percent in service sector. Compared to the same period of the previous year, the share of agricultural sector in employment decreased by 1.3 points, the share of construction sector decreased by 0.8 points, while the share of industry sector increased by 0.6 points and the share of service sector increased by 1.4 points.