Norwegian state welfare agency NAV has registered another slight deline in unemployment during the past month. The number of residents registered as wholly without work declined by another 500 people.
Unemployment declined the most in Østfold county, eastern Norway, and in Sogn og Fjordane in the mountains of central Norway. It rose the most in Rogaland and Aust-Agder, counties hit hard by the slowdown in the oil and offshore sector, and in Finnmark in the far north of Norway.
“There has been a reduction during the past few months,” stated NAV diretor Sigrun Vågeng in a press release Friday. She said more unemployed had started working in job retraining programs while there were fewer new applications from people looking for work.
A total of 87,700 people were registered as wholly without work in July, 2,400 more than at the same time last year. That resulted in an unemployment rate calculated by NAV at 3.2 percent of the total workforce, compared to 3.1 percent last year.
newsinenglish.no staff
