Unemployment rate drops to 6% in Q1 2024

The unemployment rate in Cyprus dropped to 6% in the first quarter of 2024 compared with 6.8% in the respective period of last year, marking a reduction of over 4,000 persons in absolute terms, Cystat said.

According to the results of the Labour Force Survey, the labour force in the first quarter of 2024 amounted to 490,232 persons or 64.5% of the population (males 69%, females 60.3%) in comparison to 492,230 persons (65.6%) in the corresponding quarter of 2023.

The number of employed persons was 460,893 and the employment rate 60.6% (males 64.9%, females 56.6%) in comparison to 458,835 persons (61.2%) in the corresponding quarter of 2023, Cystat said.

According to the survey, the number of unemployed persons amounted to 29,339 and the unemployment rate to 6.0% of the labour force (males 5.9%, females 6.1%) in comparison to 33,394 persons (6.8%) in the corresponding quarter of 2023.

For the age group 20-64, the employment rate was 78%, with the rate for males amounting to 82.2% and for females 74.1%. In the corresponding quarter of 2023, the rate was 78.6% (males 83.9%, females 73.7%).

For the age group 55-64 the employment rate was 69.5%, in comparison to 65,6% in the respective quarter of 2023.

Services have highest employment rate

By sector, the biggest percentage of employed persons was in Services (80.9%), followed by Manufacturing (16.7%) and Agriculture (2.4%).

For the 1st quarter of 2023, the corresponding percentages were: Services 80.7%, Manufacturing 16.9% and Agriculture 2.4%, Cystat said.

Furthermore, the share of part-time employment to total employment was 9.4% or 43,143 persons (males 7.2%, females 11.6%) with the corresponding rate for the 1st quarter of last year amounting to 9.,9% (males 7.4%, and females 12.5%).

According to Cystat, 89.6% or 412,732 of the total employed persons were employees, of which 12.6% (52,044 persons) had a temporary job. The respective figures of the Q1 2023 were 89.2% of total employment of which 12.1% had a temporary job.

The unemployment rate in young persons aged 15-24 years old, was 16.2% of the labour force of the same age group (males 17.9%, females 14.5%), compared with 16.0% (males 18.7%, females 13.4%) in the corresponding quarter of last year.

As regards the duration of unemployment, 59.7% of the total unemployed persons searched for a job for a period of less than 6 months, 14.1% for a period of 6-11 months, whereas a percentage of 26.2% were long-term unemployed.

The corresponding rates for the 1st quarter of 2023 were 51.1%, 16.7% and 32.2%, respectively, Cystat added.

(Source: CNA)