Ghana: Over 500,000 persons in labour force were unemployed, mult weidimensionally poor in 2022

 

 

 

At least a quarter of a million persons were unemployed and living in food-insecure households in all four quarters of 2022, according to the Ghana Statistical Service.

 

The estimated number of unemployed and food insecure persons in the labour force ranged from 250,000 in the third quarter to 330,000 in the second.

 

These statistics according to the GSS were from the recently released Ghana Annual Household Income and Expenditure Survey: Quarter 4 2022 Labour Statistics Report.

 

Per the report, over half a million persons in the labour force were unemployed and multidimensionally poor in every quarter of 2022, ranging from an estimated 550,000 in the fourth quarter to 780,000 in the first quarter.

 

 

“The unemployment rate in the fourth quarter was 11.5 percent, the lowest recorded across all quarters in 2022. Fourth quarter unemployment rates are higher for females (12.5%) compared to males (10.3%); and higher in urban areas (14.3%) compared to rural (7.8%), patterns consistent with what was observed for the previous three quarters.”

 

“Two in every three (68.1%) employed persons 15 years and older in the fourth quarter were in vulnerable employment (i.e. self-employed without employees or contributing family workers), the highest recorded across all quarters,” GSS added in its report.

 

 

The Ghana Statistical Service also reported that, all regions except for Greater Accra had more than half of the employed persons in vulnerable employment.

 

It added that, the highest rate of vulnerable employment in the fourth quarter was recorded in the North East (92.1%), Savannah (90.6%), and Northern (84.2%) regions.

 

“Over 2.1 million persons aged 15 to 35 years were not in education, employment, or training (NEET) across all quarters. In the fourth quarter, one in every five persons (20.2%) aged 15 to 35 years was NEET. Greater Accra recorded the highest NEET rate (26.5%) in the fourth quarter, followed by the Ashanti (22.9%) and Upper East (22.9%) regions.”

 

 

“All 16 regions recorded double-digit figures for youth NEET in all quarters with the lowest recorded in Oti in the fourth quarter (11.2%).”

 

The Annual Household Income and Expenditure Survey (AHIES) is the first nationally representative high-frequency household panel survey in Ghana.