South Africa's Unemployment Rate Up in Q1

The figure represents an increase of 0.2 percent from the fourth quarter last year, Statistics South Africa said in its latest Quarterly Labor Force Survey.

The number of employed people increased 258,000 to 16.2 million in the first quarter of the year, while that of unemployed people increased 179,000 to 7.9 million, the survey showed.

Finance, community and social services, and agriculture recorded the largest employment gains, while the employment losses were recorded in sectors including trade, mining, construction and manufacturing, according to the survey.

Millions of jobs were lost in South Africa during the COVID-19 pandemic, and the labor market has not since recovered, said Dawie Roodt, an economist at the Efficient Group, a wealth management company. He added that South Africa's weak economic growth was one of the underlying issues contributing to the rising unemployment rate.

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