The Turkish Statistical Institute (Turkstat) yesterday released the labor force statistics for February. According to the data, the unemployment rate was 11.2 percent, indicating a 0.1 percent decrease in February compared to the previous month. However, the number of unemployed individuals over the age of 15 increased by 401,000, totaling 3.22 million in February compared to the same period of 2014.

In the same period, the non-agricultural unemployment rate was 13.2 percent, an increase of 1.1 percent. While the youth unemployment rate, which includes those aged 15 to 24, increased 3 percent, hitting 20 percent, the total unemployment rate for those aged 15 to 64 increased 1.1 percent to 11.4 percent.

The number of employed over the age of 15 increased to 577,000, hitting 25.57 million in the same period while the employment rate was 44.4 percent, an increase of 0.3 percent. The labor force increased by 979,000 people, reaching 28.8 million total workers. The labor force participation rate hit 50.1 percent with an increase of 1 percent. The ratio of people who worked without any social security related to their main job was 31.7 percent, down 2.1 percent. Total public sector employment increased 2.1 percent to reach 3.41 million.