Azernews.Az

By Amina Nazarli

Azerbaijan’s unemployment rate reduced to 4.9 percent by late 2014, said Salim Muslimov, Azerbaijani Minister of Labour and Social Protection of Population.

"According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, as of late 2014, the unemployment rate in Europe was 11.5 percent, particularly in Spain - 24 percent, Portugal - 13.4 percent, Italy - 13.2 percent, Slovakia - 12.9 percent, France - 10.5 percent, and so on," he said at the conference entitled "Macroeconomic policy and its impact on employment policy" February 2.

The minister said that 80 percent of the new jobs created in the country fall on the regions of the country. This eliminated the disparity between labor markets in the regions of Azerbaijan.

Muslimov said that Azerbaijan is the first country in the post-Soviet area that used an electronic registration system of employment contracts.

"On the one hand, this is the effective method of protecting the rights of the working population,” he said. “On the other hand, this allows to quickly spotting any changes on the labor market."

Moreover, the minister said that the demographic situation in the country is stable. The average annual population growth is 1.3 percent. The share of young people is about 28 percent of the country's population, while the youth unemployment rate is twofold more compared to the overall rate of the country.

The minister also spoke about problems, saying that as in any other country, Azerbaijan has some problems in the labor area.

"The high share of production and agriculture among the employed population causes certain concern,” he said. “In such developed countries as the U.S., Canada, European countries, the share of those employed in agriculture is 2.5 percent, while this figure is 37 percent here."

The agricultural sector is important not only for increasing Azerbaijan's export potential, but also for restoring and protecting the country's food security. Protecting the quality and price of food stuff produced in Azerbaijan and producing them in accordance with quality standards are among the main priorities of the country's food security.

Earlier, President Ilham Aliyev signed a decree declaring 2015 as the Year of Agriculture.

As a result of agrarian reforms carried out in Azerbaijan, some guarantees were made for the dynamic development of agriculture. Thus, the agricultural sector greatly was changed, new economic and property relations were formulated and the regulatory framework was improved.

Azerbaijan is meeting the population's demands for meat products by 90 percent, poultry meat by 81 percent, eggs by 80 percent, dairy products by 75 percent, vegetable oil by 65 percent, and butter by 50 percent through local production.

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Amina Nazarli is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @amina_nazarli

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