Philippine jobless rate rises to 11.1% for July

Asian Economic News, Sept 18, 2000

MANILA, Sept. 14 Kyodo

The Philippines' unemployment rate rose to 11.1% in July from 8.4% a year earlier, according to data released Thursday by the government.

But the July figure was down compared with 13.9% in April, the National Statistics Office (NSO) said. The office releases the unemployment data in every three months.

July's number rose from a year earlier despite a workforce drop of 25,000 workers, or 0.1%, the NSO added.

The NSO said the number of employed people decreased by 877,000, or 3.0%, to 28.2 million.

Agricultural employment fell by 10.1% to 10.6 million from 11.8 million in July last year, while industrial employment decreased by 1.8%. Services employment rose 3.0% to 13.1 million from 12.8 million a year earlier.

The NSO said the number of underemployed, or people who want to work more hours, moved down to 21.4% of the entire labor force in July from 22.3% a year ago.