Turkey: Unemployment rate at 13.4% in October 2019

By Aysu Bicer

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey’s unemployment stood at 13.4% in October 2019, said the country's statistical authority on Friday.

The October figure showed an annual rise of 1.8 percentage points, the Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat) said.

"The number of unemployed persons aged 15+ increased by 608,000 to 4.39 million persons in the period of October 2019 in Turkey compared with the same period of the previous year," it noted.

Non-agricultural unemployment rate stood at 15.7%, showing a 2.1 percentage point rise year-on-year.

The unemployment rate for young people aged 15-24 surged 3 percentage points to 25.3% during the same period.

The figure for unemployed people aged 15-64 climbed 1.8 percentage points to 13.7% in the month on a yearly basis.

Meanwhile, the number of people employed fell to 28.34 million in October, down 527,000 from the same month of previous year, indicating a 45.9% employment rate in the country.

"According to the distribution of employment by sector, 17.9% were employed in agriculture, 20% in industry, 5.8% in construction, and 56.3% in services," it said.

Official data showed Turkey's labor force participation rate dropped 0.7 percentage points to 53% in October year-on-year.

As laid out in Turkey's new economic program announced last September, the government targeted a 12.9% unemployment rate for 2019.