-as NBS adopts new methodology
By Ojogbane David
Nigeria’s unemployment figure is expected to drop from its current rate of 33.3 percent.
The drop is expected following the adoption of a new methodology for calculations the Nigeria Labour Force Survey by the Nigeria Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
The National Bureau of Statistics will release its new unemployment and employment figures for the country by May 2023.
Experts, including global audit and tax advisory firm, KPMG, had projected that Nigeria’s unemployment rate is expected to rise to 40.6% as compared to 2022’s 33.3%.
Our Correspondent however, report that experts had faulted what they described as the NBS high standards for definition of unemployment for the ridiculous unemployment numbers in the country.
In 2021, the Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige alleged that the country’s employment data might be inaccurate, particularly the methodology used in arriving at the figures by the NBS.
News Desk reports that the NBS, had in May 2015, unveiled the revised concepts and methodology for computing labour statistics in the country.
The then Statistician General of the Federation/Chief Executive, NBS, Dr. Yemi Kale, had, while justifying the change in methodology, explained that there was “no universal standard definition of unemployment, as various countries adopt definitions to suit their local priorities.”
He said: “Virtually all countries, however, use the International Labour Organisation (ILO) definition, or a variant of it to compute unemployment.
“The ILO definition covers persons aged 15–64 who during the reference period (which is usually the week preceding the time the survey is administered) were available for work, actively seeking work, but were unable to find work.”
But Ngige argued that “There has been a little confusion as to the accuracy of data generated by the NBS. So, we want to align everything tomorrow. The World Bank says the NBS methodology doesn’t conform with the global standard, especially the ILO format of arriving at such Employment Index.”
But in explaining its new methodology, the NBS on its official twitter page explained that, “We have revised the methodology for the Labour Force Survey which produces the Unemployment Report, to ensure alignment with international standards and best practices.”
Our Correspondent reports that the new methodology adopted by the NBS has some changes, including updated definitions of Employment, Unemployment, and Underemployment.
For instance in the old methodology, NBS considers a person that has worked less than 20 hours in a week to be unemployed, whereas, in other countries including the United States, persons who have workrd only one hour in a week are considering employed.
But under the new method, indeed who worm for 1 hour to 39 hours in a week will be considered employed but under
A governance and policy researcher, Idris Oseni while reacting, said “If you apply the ILO definition for who is ‘Unemployed’, you’d find the 33% presented by the NBS is way over-Inflated.”
He said further that, “Global benchmark categorises anyone working more than 1hour per week as ‘Employed’ and feeds into their statistics of unemployment rate calculation. If Nigeria adopts this, it’s Unemployment rate date would drop by a factor of 12%”
Another public commentator, Okechukwu Ikenna, said, “With these new methodology, you’d see a jump in employed people which means the reported unemployment percentage will fall.”
In his reaction, Comrade James Eustace of the Nigeria Labour Congress said, “there are different parameters to calculating the unemployment rate. We must adopt the realistic model and matrix for Nigeria. What does it amounts to for a Nigerian who worked only an hour a day with little or nothing in terms of wage?. We must define what is work in real context before using the working hour parameter.”
