The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) has reported that the number of unemployed Nigerians rose from 17.6 million to 20.9 million from the fourth quarter of 2017 to the third quarter of 2018.

The unemployment report, released Monday, showed that Nigeria’s working age population, being people aged 15 to 64 years, increased from 111.1 million to 115.5 million.

Analysis of the report showed that the total number of people in employment increased from 68.4 million in Q3 2015 to 68.72 million in Q3 2016, to 69.09 million in Q3 2017 and 69.54 million in Q3 2018.

The report showed that the total number of people in full-time employment (at least 40 hours a week) increased from 51.1 million in Q3 2017 to 51.3 million in Q3, 2018.

The report revealed that the total number of people in part-time employment (or underemployment) decreased from 13.20 million in Q3 2015 to 11.19 million in Q3 2016 but increased to 18.02 million in Q3 2017 and to 18.21 million in Q3 2018.

The total number of people classified as unemployed, which means they did nothing at all or worked too few hours (under 20 hours a week) to be classified as employed increased from 17.6 million in Q4 2017 to 20.9 million in Q3 2018.

The report said out of the 20.9 million people who were unemployed, 8.77 million of them were first-time job seekers, 0.93 million unemployed because they lost their jobs and 11.1 people were working for less than 20 hours.