Numbers of Unemployed Nigerians Stood at 21.764 million in Q2 2020

The number of people within the employable category and actively looking for a job rose from 23.1 percent in the third quarter of 2018 to 27.1 percent in Q2 2020.

According to the data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) on Friday, the people in the economically active or working-age population between 15 and 65 years old rose to 116,871,186 in the second quarter of the year. This was 1.2 percent higher than the 115,492,969 filed in the third quarter of 2018.

While the people in the active population group that are willing and able to work were estimated at 80,291,894, representing 11.3 percent decline from the figure posted in Q3 2018.

The report noted that those between the age bracket of 25-34 percent were highest and represents 29.1 percent or 23,328,460 of the entire labour force.

The total number of people working during the period under review rose from 22.8 percent to 31.5 percent. A break down showed 58,527,276 people were in employment. Out of which 35,585,274 were in full-time employment — those that worked 40+ hours per week — while 22,942,003 were under-employed — those that were working between 20-29 hours per week.

Accordingly, the underemployment rate increased from 20.1 percent in the third quarter of 2018 to 28.6 percent in the second quarter of 2020. Therefore, the total number of unemployed people stood at 21.764 million in the second quarter of 2020.

Unemployment and underemployment combined stood at 55.7 percent in the period under review.

“A combination of both the unemployment and underemployment rate for the reference period gave a figure of 55.7 percent. This means that 27.1 percent of the labour force in Nigeria or 21,764,617 persons either did nothing or worked for less than 20 hours a week, making them unemployed by our definition in Nigeria. This is an additional 836,969 persons from the number in that category in Q3, 2018,” the report stated.