Colombo, Dec 27 (NIA) – Sri Lanka’s overall unemployment rate reported for females is 7.3 percent when compared to 3.1 percent for males, official data showed here on Tuesday.
The survey results further revealed that unemployment among females is higher than that of males, in all age groups, the Census and Statistics Bureau said.
Sri Lanka’s unemployment level among both male and female has risen to 4.6 percent in the second quarter of 2016 when compared to the 4.2 percent in the first quarter of the year. The number of unemployed persons is estimated as 377,987 during the second quarter.
Youth unemployment (age 15-24 years) has also seen a significant increase with the second quarter of 2016 recording 22.2 percent. That reports the highest unemployment rate among all other age groups.
Further rates for both male and female are 17.7 and 30.5 percent respectively for age group 15—24.
Even among the educated, female unemployment rates are higher than those of males in all levels of education.
The Census and Statistics Bureau showed that the highest unemployment rate was reported from the G.C.E (A/L) and above group which is about 8.6 percent. Out of that 4.6 percent and 12.5 percent are for male and female respectively.
“This further shows that the problem of unemployment is more acute in the case of educated females than educated males, which was observed consistently over the results of previous survey rounds as well,” the Bureau said.
(Pic Courtesy Sunday Times)
