The unemployment rate in Croatia rose to 21.1% in December, the highest level since March 2003, the National Bureau of Statistics said on Tuesday.
The figure was in accordance with expectations of five analysts polled by Hina. Their projections ranged from 21% to 21.2%.
"The average unemployment rate last year was 19.1%, which was the highest registered unemployment rate since 2003 when it reached 19.5%," said Zrinka Zivkovic-Matijevic, head of the Economic Research Department at Raiffeisenbank Austria in Zagreb.
She said that the unemployment rate this year could be retained at last year's level provided that negative trends in the economic sector were stopped.
