Zambia Statistics Agency (ZamStats) has revealed that Zambia’s youth unemployment rate in 2020 stood at 19.9 percent.
According to the 2020 Labour Force Survey released by ZamStats Interim Statistician General, Mulenga Musepa, the youth unemployment rate was higher in urban areas as compared to rural areas.
Youth unemployment rate was higher in urban areas at 20.8 percent than in rural areas at 18.0 percent,
Musepa said.
In urban areas, female youth unemployment rate was higher at 24.7 percent than did male unemployment rate of 17.7 percent. The same is observed for male youth unemployment rate in rural areas which stood at 19.2 percent and 17.2 percent.
Musepa added that Western Province had the highest youth unemployment rate of 43.2 percent while Eastern Province had the lowest youth unemployment rate at 6.8 percent.
The Interim statistician further said that the total number of unemployed youths was estimated at 375,025.
Of the total unemployed youths, 10.9 percent were the 15-19 year-olds, 39.8 percent were the 20-24 year-olds, 29.1 percent were the 25-29 year-olds while 20.2 percent were the 30-35 year-olds,
he said.
And Musepa said that the primary objective of the Labour Force Survey is to provide labour market statistics for planning and policy formulation for development.
The labour force survey report is enriched with socio-economic and demographic indicators such as employment to-population ratio, labour force participation rate, unemployment rate and working conditions, hours of work,
he said.
The use of labour market statistics and indicators is quite widespread, as it enhances planning of labour market systems in various aspects including employment creation, minimum wage determination, skills gap identification, training programs, as well as determining supply and demand for labour.
The 2020 Labour Force Survey (LFS) presented annual results, arising from an analysis of a combined dataset drawn from 2020 quarterly LFSs.