Nigeria’s unemployment rate has risen to 33.3 percent in the fourth quarter of 2020 (Q4, 2020), representing 23.18 million people.
This is based on the Q4, 2020 Unemployment and Underemployment report released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
NBS has published the Q4 2020 Unemployment/Underemployment report. You can download the report on the NBS website @ https://t.co/Bf9NpV2eTU pic.twitter.com/dJQOfLrZni
— NBS Nigeria (@nigerianstat) March 15, 2021
“This means that 33.3 percent of the labour force in Nigeria or 23,187,389 persons either did nothing or worked for less than 20 hours a week, making them unemployed by our definition in Nigeria,” the NBS said.
Underemployment rate stood at 22.8 percent in the fourth quarter of 2020 from 28.6 percent in the second quarter.
The NBS said total unemployment and underemployment rate stood at 40 percent in Q4 2020 from 35.2 percent in Q2 2020.
Nigeria’s unemployment rate had hit a record 27.1 percent in the second quarter of 2020, a rise which surpassed earlier labour force report of 23.1 percent in the third quarter of 2018.
In 2017, the country’s unemployment rate was 18.8 percent in the third quarter of 2017, according to the bureau.
The NBS said the number of persons in the labour force – that is people within ages 15 to 64, who are able and willing to work- was estimated to be 69,675,468. This is 13.22 percent less than the number of persons in Q2, 2020.
Of this number, those within the age bracket of 25 to 34 were highest, with 20.09 million or 28.34 percent of the labour force.
The statistics means that as of Q4 2020, only 57.09 percent of Nigeria’s economically active population are in the labour force.
Amaka E. Nliam
