Ljubljana, 04 April (STA) - Registered unemployment in Slovenia fell to 46,877 at the end of March, which is a 5.7% drop compared to late February and a 6.9% decrease year-on-year, the Employment Service said on Thursday.
In March, 4,292 newly unemployed persons were registered, which is 8.3% less than in February and 0.7% less than in March 2023. Among them, 1,695 registered with the service because their fixed-term contracts expired, which is down 13.5% on February and 10.2% less year-on-year.
Another 806 were made redundant, which is 20.5% less than in February and 7.8% more than in March 2023. A total of 46 people became unemployed due to bankruptcies, down by 48.9% compared to February and up 91.7% year-on-year. 400 were first-time job seekers, up 4.4% from the month before and down 2.7% year-on-year.
Most of the persons who registered as unemployed in March used to work in manufacturing and in motor vehicle sales, maintenance and repairs.
Of the 7,131 people who were deleted from the unemployment registry in March, 5,078 got employed or self-employed, which is 7.9% more than in February and 2.6% less than in March last year. Most of them got a job as retail clerks, secretaries, workers in manufacturing, masons, cleaners, warehouse workers and drivers.
On a monthly basis, unemployment was down in all parts of the country in March, but especially in the areas of Murska Sobota (-9.7%) and Ptuj (-9.3%) in the northeast. The Novo Mesto area in the southeast recorded the lowest decrease as unemployment fell by 2.8% there.
Most of the country saw unemployment decrease year-on-year, except for the Ptuj area where it increased by 1.1%. The Nova Gorica area saw unemployment decrease the most year-on-year as it dropped by 13.9%.
Employers advertised 13,769 job vacancies in March, which is 7.5% more than in February and down 16.5% from last March. Most vacancies were for light work in manufacturing and construction.
In the first quarter of 2024, there were on average 49,401 registered unemployed persons in Slovenia, which is 6.9% less than in the same period of 2023. During this time 18,239 people newly registered, up 7.6% from Q1 in 2023, and 19,715 were removed from the registry, up 0.5% from the same period of 2023.
The Employment Service detected a significant drop in job vacancies, which totalled 41,015 in the first three months of 2024 and decreased by 9.8% compared to the first quarter of 2023.
The latest registered unemployment rate was released today - it was at 5.2% in January, which was 0.3% more than the month before and 0.4% lower than in January last year.
