8,830 looking for a job

There were 8,830 registered unemployed with the Employment and Training Corporation in February this year - 6,971 males and 1,859 females, the National Statistics Office said.

In January the number was 8,794.

The number of persons registering under part 1 of the unemployment register in February amounted to 8,124, and those registering under part 2 amounted to 706.

A total of 1,237 persons on the register were under 20 years of age, 1,537 were between 20-24, 1,087 between 25-29, 2,662 between 30-44 and 2,307 aged 45 years and over.

The NSO observed that 4,175 persons had been registering for work for under 20 weeks at the end of the month.

Under both part 1 and 2 there were 631 registered unemployed in Gozo and 8,199 in Malta.

In Gozo there were 449 males and 182 females registering for work, while there were 6,522 males and 1,677 females in Malta.

The NSO said the unemployment rates for February this year were not available since the data of the labour supply for this month have not yet been published.

The unemployment rate in October 2003 stood at 5.7 per cent of the labour supply.