By Modupe Gbadeyanka
The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) on Tuesday said the unemployment rate in Nigeria increased to 5.3 per cent in the first quarter of 2024 from 5.0 per cent in the third quarter of 2023.
The organisation stated further that the unemployment rate among males was 4.3 per cent and 6.2 per cent among females, and by place of residence, it was 6.0 per cent in urban areas and 4.3 per cent in rural areas for Q1 2024.
Looking at the youth, the youth unemployment rate was 8.4 per cent in Q1 2024, showing a decrease from 8.6 per cent in Q3 2023.
In a report released yesterday, the agency disclosed that the unemployment rate among persons with post-secondary education stood at 9.0 per cent in the period under review, while the unemployment rate among persons between the ages of 15 and 24 was 8.4 per cent in the first three months of this year, lower than the 8.6 per cent reported in Q3 of 2023.
The NBS revealed in the report that in Q1 of 2024, 73.2 per cent of Nigeria’s working-age population was employed compared with the 75.6 per cent recorded in Q3 of 2023.
It stated that disaggregating by sex, the employment-to-population ratio was 74.2 per cent for males and 72.3 per cent for females in the period under review.
Additionally, the employment-to-population ratio in urban areas was 69.5 per cent and 78.9 per cent in rural areas in Q1 2024 versus 71.1 per cent and 80.7 per cent in Q3 2023, respectively.
The stats office noted that between January and March 2024, about 92.7 million of the Nigerian population engaged in informal employment, stating that females were more likely to be in informal employment than males, adding that the rate of informal employment among rural dwellers was 97.6 per cent while the urban informality rate was 89.0 per cent.
It stated that the proportion of persons in self-employment declined from 86 per cent in Q1 2023 to 84 per cent in Q1 2024, noting that the self-employment rate among females was 87.9 per cent while males was 79.9 per cent and by place of residence, the rate of self-employed persons in rural areas was 91.9 per cent and 78.2 per cent in urban areas.