Khaberni - The Director General of the Department of Statistics, Haider Freihat, said on Monday that the unemployment rate for Jordanians only reached 21.4% during the third quarter of last year, for the age group of 15 years and older, with the highest rate recorded among males, while the total unemployment rate in Jordan was 16.2%, which includes all unemployed individuals in the kingdom, whether Jordanian or non-Jordanian.
Freihat explained on "Al-Mamlaka" that the unemployment rate includes those who are students and job seekers or workers, noting that the economic participation rate for the age group 15 years and older was 40% of the population.
He added that the Department of Statistics bases its calculation on ages 15 and older, according to the global standard issued by the International Labour Organization, aiming to detect illegal child labor.
He pointed out the existence of a category in schools and universities, which is divided into two types, a part that works and a part that does not work, stressing the importance of understanding the conditions of this category within the statistics.
Freihat mentioned that the war on Gaza and various crises in the Middle East were supposed to lead to an exacerbation of unemployment, but this did not happen in Jordan, where these impacts were contained, with an existing "downward trend" in unemployment rates.
