Thebe Mabanga
The unemployment rate rose to 33.6% in the second quarter as the number of unemployed people increased by 345,000 to about 8.5 million.
Statistics South Africa reported on Tuesday that the official unemployment rate increased by 0.9 percentage points from 32.7% in the first quarter of the year.
The number of employed people declined by 16,000 to about 16.7 million during the quarter, while the number of unemployed increased sharply.
Taken together, this resulted in the labour force increasing by 329 000, or 1.3%, to about 25.2 million.
Stats SA also reported that the number of discouraged work-seekers fell by 227 000 to about 3.7 million.
This is a developing story.
