Finland's October unemployment rate hits 8.2 percent, highest rate for month in 6 years
By: MATTI HUUHTANEN
Associated Press
11/24/09 2:10 PM EST
HELSINKI — Finland's unemployment rate jumped to 8.2 percent last month, the highest October rate in six years, the government statistics agency said Tuesday.
In October 2008, the joblessness rate was 5.8 percent and in September this year it was 7.3 percent, Statistics Finland said.
Finland has been badly hit by unemployment because of its dependency on the export trade. Many companies, especially in the forest products sector, have announced large layoffs during the past year.
Finnish Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen cautioned that unemployment will continue to grow despite the government's forecast that the recession had bottomed out.
"Even though there will be an increase in overall unemployment figures we must target our efforts at breaking the growth in youth unemployment," Vanhanen told reporters. "That is why we have increased funds, for example, in training programs."
Finland, with a population of only 5.3 million, is a member of the euro zone — the EU countries that have adopted the common euro currency.
The government said that the Nordic country's economy shrank by a record 11.6 percent in September from a year earlier, the sharpest fall yet in the current recession.
The economy has shown negative GDP figures since September 2008 when year-on-year growth was 2.8 percent, and the government has warned the economy will shrink by 6 percent in the full year. A pickup was not expected until next year when growth would be a modest 0.5 percent.
Unemployment, which had been on a gradual 10-year decline, began its upward climb a year ago. It peaked at a 10.9 percent in May. In October 2003, it was 8.3 percent.
The latest figures mean that last month 215,000 people were out of work — up from 155,000 a year earlier.
___
On the Net:
Statistics Finland: http://www.stat.fi/index(underscore)en.html
