Number of unemployed Romanians in the private sector rises by 9.7% in December, data show

The number of jobless people in the private sector climbed 9.7 percent in the last month last year to 285,144, representing about three quarters of the total number of unemployed in Romania, data from the labor force agency ANOFM show.

ANOFM counted 403,441 jobless people in December. The unemployment rate was of 4.4 percent last month, up 0.3 percentage points month-on-month and also year-on-year.This is the highest growth of the unemployment rate since 2002, according to the agency.

The annual average rate of unemployment was of 3.9 percent in 2008 and the average number of jobless people stood at 362,429.

The number of unemployed men added 0.4 percentage points in December to 4.5 percent and of women advanced by 0.2 percentage points to 4.4 percent.

ANOFM said most unemployed people worked in constructions, agriculture and wood industry.The highest unemployment rate was registered in the county of Vaslui (2,958) while the lowest was seen in Ilfov (34).

The work force market in Romania stood still awaiting the new budget bill and following the economic crisis, so the number of jobs registered at ANOFM reached a new historical minimum of 5,446, the agency's general secretary Gheorghe Clement told NewsIn this week.

This is the steepest number of job offers since 1989.

It seems companies also lost courage owing to the current crisis and are now pending for the new budget and the measures to be taken by the government in a bid to stimulate the economy, said Clement, adding the labor force market has frozen as no one hires anymore.

The job offer from ANOFM counts offers from companies for January 9-13. Clement deems the labor force market could recover starting March, similar to the previous years.

NewsIn