- Unemployment Rates Highest in South-South States
The data released by the National Bureau of Statistics on Friday revealed the high rate of unemployment rates across the South-South states despite huge oil exploration in the states.
According to the report that listed unemployment rates for every region in the country during the third quarter of 2018, states in the Southern part of the nation recorded the highest unemployment rates during the period.
Breaking down the unemployment report into six Geopolitical Zones in the country.
| Geopolitical Zones |
Unemployment Rates |
Unemployment Percent |
| North Central states |
3,204,235 |
27% |
| The North Eastern States |
2,61,971 |
22% |
| North West states |
3,871,637 |
24% |
| South East states |
2,871,659 |
23% |
| South Southern states |
5,385,608 |
32% |
| South West states |
2,978,537 |
14% |
| Total unemployed Nigerians |
20,927,648 |
23.1% |
From the data, Southern states of the country recorded the highest unemployment rate with 5.4 million unemployed people or 32 per cent of the total number of unemployed Nigerians.
With the labour force of 16.7 million people, substantial internally generated rated revenue and billions of naira in monthly allocations, one would expect a better job number from the Southern states.
In fact, Akwa Ibom and Rivers, two of Nigeria’s richest states recorded 37 per cent and 36.4 per cent unemployment rates, respectively.
On the other hand, South West region created the most jobs despite its huge population. The labour force population was put at 21.4 million, with the number of unemployed persons standing at about 3 million or 14 per cent during the period under review. The lowest among the six geopolitical zones.
New job creation remained low across the Nigerian federation, especially among the youths with unemployment/underemployment rate of 55.4 per cent, higher than the national rate of 43.3 per cent.
World Bank, in a recent report titled ‘Pathways to Better Jobs in IDA Countries,’ stated that unemployment is not the main problem in low-income nations like Nigeria but huge underemployment due to too many idle hours is responsible for poverty in those economies.
The report further stated that people work in low-income nations because they cannot afford otherwise. Therefore, overqualified highly skilled employees are willing and ready to take up any available job just to get by.
The high underemployment rate in Nigeria validated the World Bank position that economic growth (GDP) in International Development Association (IDA) nations does not translate to job creation except it is an inclusive growth that is labour intensive.
Therefore, until Federal Government enhanced economic productivity through job creation, high underemployment and poverty will continue to undermine national growth.