Belstat has published the results of its household sample survey on employment issues for the second quarter of 2026. The survey is used to calculate the unemployment rate based on the methodology of the International Labour Organization (ILO).
In the second quarter, the employment rate among people aged 15–74 stood at 69% (up 0.9 percentage points from the first quarter), while the unemployment rate was 2.1% of the labour force (down 0.2 percentage points). By comparison, the ILO-methodology unemployment rate stood at 2.5% in the fourth quarter of 2025 and averaged 2.5% for the whole of last year. A year earlier, in the second quarter, the rate was 2.6%.
The unemployment rate among women was 1.8% (down 0.1 percentage points from the first quarter), while among men it was 2.4% (down 0.4 percentage points).
The unemployment rate in urban areas stood at 2.2% (down 0.3 percentage points), compared with 1.9% in rural areas (up 0.1 percentage points).
The employment rate among the working-age population reached 85.3% (up 0.9 percentage points), including 85.7% (up 0.9 percentage points) among women, 84.8% (up 0.6 percentage points) among men, 85% (up 0.6 percentage points) in rural areas and 85.3% (up 0.9 percentage points) in urban areas.
Among respondents, 68.6% searched for work online or through the media, while 59.1% sought help from relatives and friends. Another 31.7% contacted the employment service or used the nationwide vacancy database, while 19.1% applied directly to employers.
