Unemployment rate in Colombia dropped to 14.4 % in June

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The unemployment rate in Colombia in June was 14.4%, a decrease of 5.4 points compared to the 19.8% recorded in the same month of 2020, when the country was experiencing the onslaught of the coronavirus pandemic and strict quarantines, informed today the National Administrative Department of Statistics (DANE).

The director of DANE, Juan Daniel Oviedo, explained that there were 20.6 million employed people in June, while the inactive population was 16.2 million.

Read also: Check out our coverage on Colombia

He detailed that there were 2.3 million additional people who obtained employment in June 2021 compared to the same period in 2020, but “there are still two million additional people to be employed” to reach the same number of the employed population in June 2019 before the coronavirus pandemic.

DANE also reported that the overall participation rate stood at 59.7%, which meant an increase of 2.3 percentage points compared to the same period in 2020 (57.4%).

In addition, the employment rate stood at 51.1%, which represented an “increase of 5.0 percentage points compared to June 2020 (46.1%)”.

Of the 2.3 million additional employed, 1.4 million are men, and 900,000 are women.

The 13 cities and metropolitan areas contributed 7.6 percentage points to the national change as their employed population increased from 8.4 million in June 2020 to 9.8 million a year later.

Trade and repair of vehicles had the highest growth in the employed population with 474,000 people, followed by transport and storage with 398,000, DANE said.

Regarding the unemployment figures, Jackeline Piraján, an economist at Scotiabank Colpatria, said that the labor market “has progressively improved as the reopening is consolidating”.