Introduction

Governments all over the world, at a certain stage of the development of their countries, seeks to know how many people are employed and unemployed. It should be noted that the higher proportion of the population gainfully employed, the higher the wealth creation leading to improved living conditions and poverty reduction. It is therefore crucial that statistics on labour and labour related issues such as the rate of employment and unemployment, the dependency rate, economically active and economically not-active populations are made available to inform policy formulation, implementation and evaluation.

The focus of this chapter is on the type of economic activity, occupation, industry, and employment status and employment sector. Although data was collected on the population five years and older, the analyses in this section are limited to the population 15 years and older.

Economic Activity Status

Activity status refers to economic and non-economic activity of respondents during the seven days preceding the census.

i. The economically active population is made up of (a) the Employed – This refer those who worked for at least one hour within the 7 days preceding the census. Those with a job but not at work, that is, persons who were temporarily not at work during the reference period but had jobs to return to, were also included in the economically active population. (b) Unemployed – comprising all persons who, during the reference period were;

• Without work and had no fixed jobs;

• Currently available for work;

• Seeking for work by taking specific steps to look for work (by writing applications, visiting job sites, and visiting employment agencies).

ii. The economically not active population is made up of those who during the reference period did not work and were not seeking for work. They are classified by reasons for not being economically active. They include; homemakers, full-time students, retired persons and people with disabilities who were unable to work because of their age or disability.

Table 4.shows the total population 15 years and older by activity status. The economically active population (employed and unemployed) account for 79.0 percent of the population 15 years and older while the economically not active constitute 21.0 percent. Among the economically active, 98.5 percent is employed. Out of the 1.5 percent who are unemployed, 43.9 percent had worked before and are seeking work and are available for work while, 56.1 percent are seeking work for the first time and available for work. Students account for 57.2 percent of the economically not active category, followed by those who did home duties or household chores (28.7%). Pensioners/retired form the least proportion (0.6%). The proportion of females who did home duties is higher than their male counterparts. This could be due to the social norm where females usually keep the home.

Figure 4.1 shows economic activity status of population 15 years and older by sex. A relatively higher proportion of the male population (98.8%) employed than the female (98.1%). Again, a higher percentage of the female (23.9%) are economically not active compared to the male population (18.4%). Furthermore, a higher proportion of the females (1.9%) than the males (1.2%) are unemployed.

Table 4.2 provides data on the economic activity status of the employed population 15 years and older by age and sex. From the Table, about 67.7 percent of persons 15-19 years are economically not active, however, quite a number (31.1%) of them are employed. Similarly, 67.9 percent of persons 20-24 years are employed. It is expected that these age groups should be in full time education, but to have these proportions employed calls for some policy intervention. From age 25 years, the proportion of persons employed within the age groups increase with increasing age, peaks at 50-54 and 55-59 years and thereafter starts to decrease. The proportion of persons who are unemployed is highest (3.5%) amongst those in the 60 to 64 age group. The same pattern is observed among the male and female populations.