Over 4 million Nigerians unemployed in 2023 – NBS

The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) has stated that 5.4 percent of Nigerians (4,792,296) are under the working-age population are unemployed in the year 2023.

Recall that the NBS had last year adopted a new methodology for its labour survey, defining those that are in the labour force to be 15 and above that are willing, available, and able when the survey is conducted.

Also, those that would be categorized as unemployed would have worked at least one hour from the previous seven days the survey would be conducted which is a departure of the 20 hours the old method carried.

In a press statement to announce the publication of the 2023 Annual and Q1 2024 Nigeria Labour Force Survey (NLFS) results, the NBS said 116.6 million, representing 53.8% of the total population, are in the working age group.

The statement signed by NBS’ Director of Communications and Public Relations, Sunday. J Ichedi, said women accounted for 52 percent of this population, with men at 48 percent.

While noting that 76.3 percent equivalent to 88.9 million individuals, participated in the survey, it said Bauchi State recorded the highest participation rate at 92.3 percent, while Ekiti State had the lowest at 63.4 percent.
It went in to state that the total working-age population in 2023, 84.1 million individuals were employed, including 20.6 million persons between the ages of 15 and 24.

“In 2023, the national employment-to-population ratio was 72.2 percent with rural areas (77.3 percent), significantly outperforming urban areas (68.7 percent). Bauchi State had the highest employment-to-population ratio at 88.4%, while Rivers State recorded the lowest at 55.7%. By sex, the EPR was 73.7% for males and 70.7% for females.”
It noted that 77.6 million individuals were engaged in informal employment, accounting for 92.2% of the employed population with Kano State having the highest number of informal workers, with about 5.2 million individuals engaged in informal employment.

“This is followed by Lagos State with 4.6 million people (excluding agriculture). The headline unemployment rate at the national level was 5.4% in 2023. At the state level, Abia recorded the highest unemployment rate at 18.7 percent, while Nasarawa had the lowest at 0.5%. In terms of educational attainment, the unemployment rate was highest at 9.4 percent among persons with post-secondary education. This was followed by those with secondary education at 6.7 percent, and those with primary education at 4.1 percent. The rate was lowest for those with no formal qualification at 3.2 percent.”

Unemployment increased in Q1 2024

The release stated that for the first quarter of 2024, the unemployment rate increased to 5.3 percent from 5.0 percent in Q3 2023 with urban area accounting for 6.0 percent unemployment rate and rural areas having 4.3 percent.

“The labour force participation rate among the working-age population declined to 77.3 percent in Q1 2024, from 79.5 percent in Q3 2023. The employment-to-population ratio was 73.2 percent in Q1 2024. This is a decrease of 2.4 percentage points compared to a ratio of 75.6 percent in Q3 2023.”

It added that the proportion of workers in wage employment rose to 16.0 percent in Q1 2024, a 3.3 percentage point increase from 12.7 percent in Q3 2023.

“By gender, 20.1 percent of males were in wage employment, compared to 12.1 percent of females. Wage employment was also higher in urban areas, at 21.8 percent than in rural areas, where it stood at 8.1 percent.”
“The unemployment rate among youth aged (15-24 years) was 8.4 percent in Q1 2024, a decrease of 0.2 percent compared to Q3 2023 (8.6 percent).”

“Nationally, 1.5% of employed Nigerians spent between 1-9 hours in a week, 4.8 percent spent between 10-19 hours in a week, approximately 25 percent worked between 20-39 hours, 22 percent between 40-48 hours, and the 46 percent worked 48hours and above in a week.”