Republic
11.09.2006
As of September 1 the jobless rate in Belarus was 1.4 per cent of the people in prime working years as against 1.7 per cent last year, Nikolai Kokhonov, chief of the main department of employment and population policy of the ministry of labour and social security, told BelTA.
He noted that positive tendencies in the labour market have been gathering momentum. Due to the sustainable economic development and employment policy, including creation of new jobs, the unemployment rate has been going down in Belarus. Thus as of September 1 there were 60 thousand unemployed, or 17.8 per cent fewer than a year ago. At the same time Nikolai Kokhonov stressed that there has been growing the number of people who apply to the state employment service for assistance. In January-August 2005, there were 199,3 thousand people, in the eight months 2006 – 203,2 thousand (a 2 per cent increase).
“We expect more people will address the state employment service in September, Nikolai Kokhonov says. – First of all, these are the school leavers who did not succeed in entering the universities and also unemployed graduates of colleges and vocational schools who are not covered by the job assignment program and also the people who were engaged in seasonal work”.
As of September 1 the highest unemployment rate in Belarus was recorded in Brest and Mogilev oblasts – 1.7 per cent of the people in prime working years. Gomel and Grodno oblasts had this index at 1.5 per cent, Minsk oblast – 1.3 per cent. In Minsk the jobless rate is traditionally lower than the national level – 0.7 per cent to the Minskers in prime working years as of September 1.
There were 30 thousand people on the dole in August in Belarus. A total of Br1 billion 283,7 million was assigned to finance the unemployment benefits which averaged Br42,757 per one unemployed.