Brussels, 15/06/2012 (Agence Europe) - The number of persons in employment fell by 0.2% in the euro area and remained stable in the EU27 in the first quarter of 2012, compared with the previous quarter, according to national accounts estimates published by Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union, on Friday 15 June. In the fourth quarter of 2011, employment fell by 0.3% in the euro area and by 0.1% in the EU27. These figures are seasonally adjusted.
The largest drops in employment rates in the first quarter of 2012, compared with the fourth quarter of 2011, were in Spain and Hungary (1.2% each), Portugal (1.1%), Cyprus (0.9%), Lithuania (0.8%) and Italy and Bulgaria (0.6% each). Employment grew in particular in Estonia (1.3%), Malta (0.9%), Poland (0.8%), Germany (0.5%) and the UK (0.4%). It remained unchanged in France, Belgium and Sweden.
The largest fall in employment was in construction (down 1.3% in the euro area and 0.8% in the EU27) and the highest increase in information and communication (+1.0% and +1.3% respectively). Compared with the same quarter of the previous year, employment fell by 0.5% in the euro area and by 0.1% in the EU27 in the first quarter of 2012. Eurostat estimates that, in the first quarter of 2012, 222.9 million men and women were employed in the EU27, with 146.1 million of them in the euro area. (LC/transl.rt)