India's unemployment rate at 5.4% in Q1: First ever quarterly PLFS data

The jobless rate for the youth (15-29 age group) in the first quarter was recorded at 14.6 per cent

The unemployment rate in the first quarter (April-June) this financial year stood at 5.4 per cent in the country, showed the first ever quarterly periodic labour force survey (PLFS) data, released for both rural and urban areas by the National Statistics Office (NSO) on Monday. 

 

The data showed that the headline unemployment rate for people aged 15 years and above in current weekly status (CWS) terms for rural areas stood at 4.8 per cent, while the rate for the urban areas was recorded at 6.8 per cent. 

 

In CWS, activity is determined on the reference period over the past seven days preceding the date of the survey. Under this, a person is considered unemployed in a week if she or he did not work even for one hour on any day during the reference week but sought or was available for work at least for one hour on any day during the reference week. 

 

Meanwhile, the jobless rate for the youth (15-29) in the first quarter was recorded at 14.6 per cent, with females having a higher rate (16 per cent) than males (14.1 per cent). This figure is important because people belonging to this age group are usually first-timers in the labour market and this metric reflects its robustness. 

 

The data further showed that 54.4 per cent people were “self-employed” during Q1, while the share of “wage employees” stood at 25.5 per cent. The rest are engaged as “casual labourers”.

 

The labour force participation rate (LFPR), which represents the share of people either working or seeking work, stood at 55 per cent in Q1, with 77.3 per cent among men and 33.4 per cent among women looking for work. The LFPR was higher in rural areas (57.1 per cent) as compared to urban areas (50.6 per cent). 

 

The sampling methodology of the PLFS was revamped by the NSO in January this year to estimate the key employment and unemployment indicators on a monthly as well as quarterly basis for both the rural and urban areas in the CWS method at all-India level. This report is the first in the series to provide quarterly estimates for both rural and urban areas.

 

Among a key change in the methodology, a rotational panel-sampling design is used in which each selected household is visited four times in four consecutive months — in the beginning with the first visit schedule in the first month and other three with the revisit schedule in the following three months for both rural and urban areas.  

 

Separately, the monthly PLFS data, also released on Monday, showed that the rise in female employment during July pulled down the jobless rate to 5.2 per cent from 5.6 per cent in June.   

 

Female labour force participation also strengthened, climbing to 33.3 per cent in July as compared with 32 per cent in June.