Indicating sluggishness in the country's job market, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) has said that the unemployment scenario in Ghana over the last two years has been showing a rising trend.

Unemployment rate in Ghana averaged 5.41 percent from 1991 until 2017, reaching an all time high of 10.40 percent in 2000 and a record low of 2.20 percent in 2013.

In 2017, more than 1.2 million persons from 15 years and older are estimated to be unemployed, representing the total unemployment rate of 11.9%.

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Of this number, about 714,916 are females, representing 57.2 per cent and 535,997 for males representing 42.8%.

In many cases, the work is not given to the deserving candidates but given to the person belonging to a particular community. So this gives rise to unemployment.

Slow economic growth

Labour markets continued to suffer from high rates of informal/agricultural employment where jobs are poorly paid and unprotected.

Unemployment rate in Ghana is showing an increasing trend since 2011.

According to the ILO, it has been argued that Ghana was experiencing 'jobless growth' due to the fact that total employment grew by only 1.1 million from 2004/05 to 2009/10 (based on the National Sample Survey), representing an employment elasticity of almost zero.

Increase in population

Constant increase in population has been a big problem among the youth. It is one of the main causes of unemployment.

Expansion of Universities

The number of universities has increased manifold. There are so many universities. As a result of this educated unemployment or white collar unemployment has increased.

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Government should step up their efforts to support skill and retraining activities to address the gaps between demand and supply of work skills and qualifications and to address long-term unemployment.