Egypt's unemployment slows in Q4/2014 to 12.9%

Newspaper Title: Ahram Online

Newspaper Number:

Monday - 16 February 2015

Egypt’s unemployment rate shrank slightly in the fourth quarter of 2014 to 12.9 percent from 13.1 percent in the prior quarter, state-run statistics body CAPMAS announced Monday.

According to CAPMAS, there are 3.7 million Egyptians nationwide who are looking for jobs but cannot find one. The country's labour force totals 27.7 million people.

Around 63 percent of unemployed people are aged between 15 and 29, and 67 percent hold diplomas and higher education certificates.

The CAPMAS quarterly report released Monday revealed that the slight improvement in unemployment levels was driven by better performance in the tourism, telecommunications and construction sectors.

"The most important economic priority for Egypt is jobs. Egypt needs to find a way of creating good jobs for its people while at the same time reducing its budget deficit and maintaining foreign exchange reserves,"  said Chris Jarvis, the IMF mission chief in Egypt last week.

The International Monetary Fund announced its report on Egypt's economy last week to show that Egypt's structural and monetary reforms were getting the economy back on track after it was hit by political turmoil as a popular uprising took place in 2011.

In the three months ending September 30th, Egypt's economy grew 6.8 percent compared to a mere one percent a year earlier when the economy suffered from upheavals following the ousting of president Mohamed Morsi.

Egypt can expect economic growth "easily north of four percent" in the fiscal year 2014/15, which ends in June, boosted by rising confidence and a windfall from lower oil prices, Hany Kadry, the minister of finance told Reuters last month.

Urban unemployment decreased to 15.5 percent in the three month ending December 31st from 17.6 percent in the same period a year earlier, while rural unemployment increased to 10.8 percent from 10.1 percent, showed the CAPMAS report.