UPDATE - Turkey creates some 550,000 new jobs in 2018

UPDATES WITH LABOR MINISTER'S COMMENTS

By Gokhan Ergocun

ISTANBUL (AA) - In Turkey, 549,000 new jobs were created last year, Turkey's statistical authority announced on Monday.

"The number of employed persons aged 15 years old and over realized as 28.74 million persons with a 549,000-person increase," TurkStat said.

It announced that the employment rate was 47.4 percent -- 65.7 percent for male, and 29.4 percent for female -- last year, up 0.3 percentage points versus 2017.

Of those who were employed in 2018, 18.4 percent were employed in agriculture, 19.7 percent in industry, 6.9 percent in construction and 54.9 percent were employed in service sector.

The labor force participation rate also increased by 0.4 percentage points to reach 54.2 percent -- 32.27 million persons -- year-on-year in 2018.

The rate was 72.7 percent for men and 34.2 percent for women.

Meanwhile, Turkey's unemployment rate was 11 percent -- 3.54 million people -- up 0.1 percentage point in 2018, versus the previous year.

The male unemployment rate was 9.5 percent and female rate was 13.9 percent.

Non-agricultural unemployment was 12.9 percent and the youth unemployment rate, comprising of the 15-24 age cohort, was 20.3 percent in 2018.

Zehra Zumrut Selcuk, the government minister responsible for family, labor and social services, said labor force participation and employment had reached a 17-year high last year.

She underlined that the government efforts to raise female employment would continue.

"The unemployment rate was 11 percent in 2018 while our target in the new economic program was 11.3 percent," the minister noted.

Turkey has launched a new campaign at the end of February for raising employment by supporting businesses.