Unemployment stood at 9.9 percent in April 2008. TurkStat data also revealed that unemployment in April increased by five points to reach 14.9 percent, when compared to the same month of 2008. The unemployment rate was 15.8 percent in March.
According to TurkStat, the unemployment rate for April in urban and rural areas was 17.5 percent and 9.5 percent, respectively. April figures brought the number of jobless to 3.61 million, some 1.28 million higher than in the same month of last year. TurkStat said the number of employed people in Turkey was 20.69 million in April 2009, noting that 24 percent of the working population was employed in the agriculture sector, 19.2 percent in the industrial sector, 5.6 percent in the construction sector and 51.2 percent in the services sector. The figures also showed that the jobless rate among Turkey's young population was 26.5 percent in April 2009, up from the 17.6 percent in April 2008, but slightly improved over the 27.5 percent in March 2009.
Commenting on the latest figures, the Confederation of Turkish Labor Unions (Türk-İş) said the government should take the soaring numbers seriously and take steps to prevent such problems. Releasing a written statement on Wednesday, the union argued that the government could address Turkey's unemployment problem with “realistic” measures. Making mention of a recent employment law bill, expected to endow private employment bureaus the right to send job seekers to employers for a temporary term, Türk-İş said such a system is no different than slavery. President Abdullah Gül vetoed the bill and sent it back to Parliament, to the relief of workers.
