The International Labor Organization on December 18 announced that according to a recent survey, the unemployment figure in Vietnam was close to one million laborers, including new and existing workers, most of who are facing difficulties in finding jobs.
On the same day, the General Statistics Office of Vietnam announced that although the number of employed people increased by 1.1 million in the past three quarters of the year, the country’s workforce also saw the same number of young people entering working age.
Until October 1, 2012, Vietnam had 53.1 million people above 15 years of age in its workforce, of which 52.1 million people were employed. 70 percent of the country’s workforce lives in rural areas. The unemployment rate in cities was higher than that of rural areas in the first three quarters of this year.
Ho Chi Minh City had the highest unemployment rate at 3.9 percent. The Mekong Delta provinces and Hanoi City took the second and third place respectively. Meanwhile, mountainous and midland regions in the North had the lowest unemployment rate at just 0.8 percent.
Notably, laborers in foreign and state-owned sectors tended to drop quarterly, reducing by 3 percent during the past three quarters of the year. Comparatively, laborers in private sectors showed increase in numbers.
