The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) has stated that Nigeria's unemployment rate has increased to 5.0 per cent in the third quarter of 2023 from the 4.2 per cent recorded in its second quarter.

In a labour force survey released on Monday, the NBS said using its new methodology, "The unemployment rate is defined as the share of the labour force (the combination of unemployed and employed people) who are not employed but who are actively searching and are available for work," it said.

The report added that the unemployment rate by sex among men was 4.0 per cent and 6.0 per cent among women while unemployment rate was 6.0 per cent in urban areas and 4.0 per cent in rural areas.

It added that youth unemployment rate was 8.6 per cent and in terms of educational attainment, the unemployment rate was 7.8 per cent among persons with post-secondary education, 6.3 per cent for those with upper secondary education, 5.5 per cent for those with lower secondary education, 4.8 per cent for those with primary education, and 2.7 per cent for those with no formal education.

"Disaggregation by sex, 90.5 per cent of women were self-employed while 84.2 per cent of men were self-employed. 80.3 per cent of employed people in urban areas were self-employed; this is lower when compared with 94.5 per cent of employed people in rural areas.

"The rate of women in informal employment is significantly higher than that of men. The rate of informal employment among people living in rural areas was 97.2 per cent while the urban informality rate was estimated at 87.5 per cent. Females are more likely to be in informal employment than males," the report said.