December 7 (SeeNews) - Moldova's official unemployment rate was 5.7% in the third quarter of 2009, up from 3.6% a year earlier, the country's statistics bureau said on Monday.
The number of unemployed in the country of four million people jumped to 76,200 at the end of September, up by 27,500 from a year earlier, the statistics bureau said in a statement.
The workforce of the ex-Soviet and mostly agricultural country fell by 2.4% year-on-year to 1.327 million in the third quarter of 2009.
The unemployment rate among men was 7.3% in the third quarter, compared to 4.1% among women. The statistics bureau also said that the official jobless rate was 7.5% in urban areas, compared to 4.6% in rural areas.