Unemployment in Colombia reached 12.5% in January against 13.6% in the same month last year, national statistics department DANE announced Wednesday.
According to Director of the DANE Christian Jaramillo, the unemployment rate corresponds to more than 2.8 million Colombians out of work while another 30.6% of the population (nearly 7 million people) are underemployed.
January’s unemployment rate stood 1.1 percentage point lower compared to the same month last year and 2.7 percentage points higher than in December when traditionally a lot of people find temporary employment.
Cities with the highest unemployment rates include Quibdo (17.2%), Popayan (16.5%), Cucuta (16.1%) and Pereira (15.9%).
Only Bogota (9.8%) and Barranquilla (7.8%) managed to keep unemployment in the single digits.