DUSHANBE, November 23, 2014, Asia-Plus -- According to the Agency of Labor and Employment Department of the Ministry of Labor, Migration, and Employment of the Population of Tajikistan, some 98,000 citizens have applied to the Agency for help over the first ten months of 2014.

Of this total, more than 62,000 individuals have been registered as job seekers, and some 44,000 individuals have been recognized as officially unemployed.

Over the same ten-month period, with the assistance of the employment services, more than 34,000 people have been provided with jobs, which is some 35 percent of the total number of all citizens who applied. The main reasons for providing a limited number of people with jobs were that the majority of the unemployed did not have the necessary technical training or had lost skills due to prolonged unemployment, as well as the low level of wages offered by employers.

During January-October 2014, unemployment benefits totaling some 2.9 million somoni (TJS) (equivalent to some 580,000 U.S. dollars) were paid to more than 6,100 people.

Including those persons remaining from 2013, on November 1, 2014, a total of nearly 85,000 people were registered with the Agency as looking for work, including some 57,000 registered as unemployed. During the first nine months of 2014, 14,644 people were sent to vocational training, 4,028 people were provided with social-paid jobs, and 3,065 people were provided with soft loans to start their own businesses.

According to the State Agency for Social Protection, Employment, and Migration of RT, over the first ten months of 2014, some 195,000 new jobs were created, which is 6.0 percent less than in the same period last year.