Labour market and unemployment in Sudan
Samia S. O. M. Nour
#2011-007
This paper examines the structure of the labour market and unemployment
in Sudan. One advantage of our analysis in this paper is that we explain
several stylized facts on labour market using new secondary data on
population, employment and unemployment based on Sudan Central Bureau of
Statistics (2010) the Fifth Sudan Population and Housing Census (2008).
An interesting element in our analysis is that we explain several
stylized facts on the relation between structure of the labour market
and demographic structure, labour force, participation rates, economic
activities, low skill level and high unemployment rate defined by
gender, mode of living and main geographic areas in Sudan. Different
from the findings in the empirical literature in support of the Phillips
curve on the negative correlation between inflation and unemployment
rates, we find positive and significant correlation between unemployment
and inflation rates in Sudan during the period (2000-2008). Moreover,
different from the analysis in the Sudanese literature we present a more
comprehensive analysis of four stylized facts on the unemployment
problem in Sudan, these include distinction of several types of
unemployment; interpretation of unemployment problem from two different
endogenous and exogenous perspectives due to endogenous and exogenous
causes; analysis of high incidence of unemployment among youth
population and high mismatch between educational qualifications -supply-
and labour market requirements- demand. The major policy implication
from our findings indicate that since unemployment problem is related to
these endogenous and exogenous causes, therefore, policies intervention
for reducing unemployment should deal with these endogenous and
exogenous causes. Notably, improvement of job creation and quality of
educational policies and consistency between educational qualifications
(output) and labour market requirements. Another major policy
implication from our result on the significant positive correlation
between increase in unemployment and inflation rates (2000-2008),
implies that macroeconomic policies aimed at or targeting reducing
inflation rates would also contribute to reduce unemployment rates in
Sudan.
Keywords: Labour market, employment, unemployment, Sudan.
JEL classification: E24, J10, J11, J20, J21, J23, J24, J64