UPDATE - Turkey: Unemployment falls to 10.4 percent

UPDATES WITH MORE DATA

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey's unemployment rate stood at 10.4 percent in December 2017, falling 2.3 percentage points on a yearly basis, the country's statistical authority said on Thursday.

According to the Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat), the number of unemployed persons age 15 and over was 3.291 million last December, a fall of 581,000 year-on-year.

"The number of unemployed persons aged 15 years old and over decreased by 581,000 to 3.29 million persons in the period of December 2017 in Turkey compared with the same period of the previous year," it said in a statement.

In the same period, the non-agricultural unemployment rate was 12.3 percent, down 2.6 percentage points.

While the youth unemployment rate, covering ages 15-24, was 19.2 percent, down 4.8 percentage points, the unemployment rate for the 15-64 age group was also down 2.3 percentage points to 10.6 percent, it added.

The number of people employed rose by nearly 1.619 million in the same period, bringing the employment rate to 46.9 percent, up 1.8 percentage points on an annual basis, the statement said.

Breaking down employment by sector, 18.3 percent of people were employed in agriculture, 19.5 percent in industry, 7.3 percent in construction, and 55 percent in services.

TurkStat added that the labour force participation rate (LFPR) was 52.4 percent, up 0.8 percentage points over the same period in 2016.

LFPR for men was 71.7 percent, up 0.2 percentage points, and the rate for women was 33.5 percent, also up 1.3 percentage points compared with the same period of the previous year, it said.

The rate of unregistered employment came in at 33.3 percent, up 0.6 percentage points from the same month in 2016, TurkStat added.