According to the International Labour Organization (ILO) report published this week, the biggest declines have been seen in southern European countries, with Portugal being among the Member States that have recorded “strong reductions” in youth unemployment, even though the rate calculated continues to exceed the community average.

“Throughout 2023, the situation of young people in the European labor market has improved consistently”, highlights the organization led by Gilbert F. Houngbo, in the report “Social and employment perspectives in the world: trends 2024”.

In the European Union as a whole, in June 2023, the youth unemployment rate stood at “just above 14%”, which corresponds to a drop of 0.3 percentage points (p.p.) compared to that recorded a year earlier.

And according to the ILO, this reduction in the number of young people without jobs was due, at least in part, to the shortage of workers felt in several European countries (including Portugal, as companies have warned).

However, the countries that make up the community bloc are experiencing different phases of post-pandemic recovery and are at different points in the economic cycle, which means that the aforementioned improvement in the situation of young people was not the same among all Member States.

In tenth place in the ranking of youth unemployment, is Portugal. Despite the aforementioned reduction, registered youth unemployment remains above the 18% threshold and, consequently, above the community average.

The Portuguese Government has highlighted improvements in this indicator, but experts — namely, the coordinator of the Youth Employment Observatory — have declared that this is still a problem to be resolved.

Almost all countries are closer to the historic minimum than the maximum.