MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Magallanes record unemployment is Chile's regions lowest

Magallanes in the extreme south is Chile's region with the lowest unemployment in the first quarter of 2007 according to the latest release from the national Statistics Office.

The 2.6% unemployment rate is 1.6 percentage points less than a year ago and 0.2 percentage points less than the previous mobile quarter (December-February). Magallanes record compares most favourably with Chile's national average of 6.6% and even higher, above 8% in metropolitan Santiago. The Chilean Statistics INE regional office in Punta Arenas said that the excellent reading can be attributed to a significant increase in female employment during summer months. Actually unemployment for women dropped a full percentage point from 4.4 to 3.4% in the first quarter of 2007 compared to the previous mobile quarter. Gabriel Parada head of the local INE office said that Magallnes in the last decade has had a good low unemployment record, shared on several occasions with other regions, but this was the first time it ranked top of the list by itself. However Parada cautioned that in coming months, with the season over, the women unemployment rate can be expected to rise. Furthermore he said that using the expression "full employment" could be misleading since INE manages figures and numbers, and this does not mean "Magallanes is an employment paradise", with virtually no statistical unemployment. Parada said that one of the reasons for the statistical success can be the fact that the overall workforce in Magallanes had changed as has the number of people not included in that category. In effect the workforce in the first quarter of 2007 was 65.310, 280 less than a year ago and 500 less than the precedent quarter. Equally with the people out of the workforce which is estimated in 56.300, an increase of 1.250 over the same period a year ago and 600 more than the previous quarter. Concluding: the number of employed was 63.610 and unemployed 1.070, during the first quarter of 2007.