Turkish unemployment rate down to 13.6 pct in February

Source: Xinhua | 2020-05-12

Turkey's unemployment rate fell 1.1 percent to 13.6 percent in February from the same month last year amid the COVID-19 pandemic, according to data unveiled on Monday.

The number of unemployed people aged 15 and above decreased by 502,000 to 4.2 million in February on a year-on-year basis, showed the data released by the Turkish Statistical Institute.

The Turkish government has taken strong measures in March to curb the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, shutting restaurants, bars, and cafes, while at the same time introduced several actions to protect the economy.

The stimulus package included tax postponement, short-time working allowance, minimum wage support, and other measures to preserve the commercial life, worth of 200 billion Turkish liras (28.2 billion U.S. dollars).

Meanwhile, on Monday, shopping malls and barbershops were allowed to open their doors as part of the government's efforts to ease the coronavirus restrictions and start a normalization process.