RIYADH — The unemployment rate among Saudis has dropped to 12.7 percent compared to 12.8 percent in the previous quarter, according to the Q4 2018 report of the General Authority for Statistics (GaStat) on the labor market. The unemployment rate among Saudi men reached 6.6 percent and among Saudi women 32.5 percent in Q4 2018. The results of the survey show that economic participation rate by Saudis for Q4 2018 was 42 percent. There are 3,111,199 male and female Saudi workers. GaStat explained that jobseekers registered in the administrative records are not subject to the international unemployment criteria and approved by the International Labor Organization (ILO). Therefore, not all of them are considered to be unemployed. As a result, not every jobseeker is unemployed. He might be seeking a job, but has a job or is self-employed and is not registered in the government records. According to GaStat, jobseekers are those who are registered in e-gates searching for jobs at the Ministry of Civil Service and at the Human Resources Development Fund's Taqat program.
