Official unemployment in Azerbaijan dropped to 5.59%

The State Committee of Statistics released data on the level of unemployment in Azerbaijan for the first half of 2012. Official unemployment decreased in comparison with the beginning of this year at 0.14% (governmental points) and amounted to 5.59%. Experts are wary of these data based on the methodology of the International Labor Organization.

According to CC, at the beginning of July this year, 245.5 thousand unemployed were men. This is about 10 thousand people in less than a year earlier. The Chairman of the Public Association Center for the Study of Economic Resources, Ruslan Atakishiyev, commenting for Turan on the official figures on unemployment, noted that these data are mainly formed by the information about the applications to the Employment Service of the Ministry of Labor and Social Protection. It is well known that people looking for jobs are reluctant to apply to offices that offer them jobs with low wages. According to experts, passive unemployment rate is 2-3 times higher than the official figures.

The State Statistics Committee does not include hundreds of thousands of heads of families, who in the course of agrarian reform acquired land shares, into the unemployed. However, the owners of most sites cannot cultivate the land for a variety of objective reasons (lack of finance, facilities, remoteness of the terrain, etc.). - 08B-