BRUSSELS – New information from the Flemish public employment service indicates that almost 50 percent of the unemployed have been without work for more than a year. But there is also good news: unemployment among young people in Flanders is at its lowest point in years.

“In 2002 less than a third of job seekers had been unemployed for more than a year,” says researcher Kris De Graaf. “But that number has grown to almost 50 percent in just four to five years’ time.”

“We are dealing with a large group of job seekers who are difficult to place and who are evidently unable to benefit from the improving economy and the decline in unemployment that should accompany that.”

Poorly educated workers still make up a large percentage of the unemployed, although the total number of unemployed unskilled workers fell last year. Young people are finding work more quickly than before, especially in the central cities that have set up guidance plans.

Last year less than a fifth of the total number of unemployed was under the age of 25.

[Copyright Expatica News 2007]

Subject: Belgian news