By FAY SIMMONS

Tribune Business Reporter

jsimmons@tribunemedia.net

Prime Minister Philip Davis KC yesterday blamed the recent 52 percent increase in jobless Bahamians to seasonal fluctuations and a growing number of persons actively seeking work.

Addressing the media, he argued that the rise in unemployed individuals over the seven months to January 2025 was influenced in part by the end of grouper season, which forced many fishermen into temporary unemployment.

“I got an understanding of how they arrive at those numbers. And you have to appreciate that there are periods when there are down periods. So, for example, I’m advised that those numbers may have gone up because of the close of the grouper season. Fishermen were not working, and they have added them to the unemployment rate,” said Mr Davis.

He added that the methodology used by the Bahamas National Statistical Institute (BNSI) to calculate unemployment includes individuals who are actively seeking jobs, which has expanded as more Bahamians enter the labour force.

“The second factor that contributed to the number is that we now have more, which is encouraging, we have more persons looking for work,” said Mr Davis.

“In arriving at the unemployment number, if you are not looking for a work and you’re not working, you’re not factored into those numbers. But if you are looking for a job and you’re not working, you’re factored into the unemployment number.

“So, what we have discovered from the assessment is that there are more persons encouraged to look for a job at the snapshot when that was taken than the same period last year.”

When asked to address comparisons to his past criticism of former prime minister Dr Hubert Minnis, who faced backlash when the unemployment rate increased from 9.9 percent to 10.1 percent, Mr Davis defended his administration’s handling of the economy.

He added that the current increase is not a reflection of poor leadership, and argued that the rise in unemployment reflects increased economic participation rather than economic decline. Mr Davis pointed to international recognition by Moody’s and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) as evidence of progress.

“When you look at the number of persons working now, if you look at what Moody’s is saying about us, all that tells about leadership. And if you want to start from where I started in 2021, where we were, and where we are today, even the IMF had to indicate we did an amazing job. And they put it in writing, put it as a remarkable job,” said Mr Davis.

“They do these work analysis by month, and they compared with the last year. And now let’s look at the next month and see how that looks.”

The Bahamas National Statistical Institute’s latest report showed that the official unemployment rate for The Bahamas rose from 7.2 percent in the 2024 third quarter to 9 percent during that year’s final three months. It rose further to double digits in the 2025 first quarter, hitting 10.8 percent.

Apart from an 8,885 increase in the number of unemployed persons between the 2024 third quarter and January 2025, the BNSI survey revealed that 65,225 persons - representing 30.4 percent of the 214,725 workers currently holding jobs - were deemed to be under-employed, “working part-time while wanting additional hours”.

“The total number of unemployed individuals in January 2025 was 25,925, with females making up 51.3 per cent. Among the unemployed, 6,960 were youth aged 15 to 24 years, almost evenly distributed by sex,” the Institute’s survey said.

“The unemployment rate for January 2025 was 10.8 per cent. The female unemployment rate was higher at 11.2 per cent, while the unemployment rate for males, 10.4 per cent. The youth unemployment rate was 20.9 per cent, with the unemployment rate for young adult females at 21.7 per cent and for young adult males it was 20.3 per cent.

“Nationally, women aged 20 to 44 and 45 to 54 were more likely to be unemployed than their male counterparts. By contrast, men aged 25-44 were slightly more likely to be unemployed when compared with women within their same age cohort.”

Some 106,480 persons were found to be “outside the labour force”, likely meaning persons who were between jobs in January 2025, stay-at-home parents and others. Of this number, some 3,720 or 3.5 percent were identified as “discouraged workers”, meaning they are part of the potential labour force but not actively looking for a job.

That 3,720 said they had given up because they were “tired of looking for jobs” or there were “no jobs in the area’. Others said they either lacked experience or there were no available job openings to match their skills, while some alleged they were viewed as too young or old by employers.

“There were 25,520 young people (aged 15 to 24 years) outside the labour force, accounting for 23.9 per cent of this group. Among these young adults, 11,870 were males and 13,650 were females,” the Institute’s survey found.

“The total labour force in January was 240,650 individuals: 121,565 males (50.5 percent) and 119, 085 females (49.5 percent). The overall labour force participation rate was 76 percent. Males had a higher participation rate of 80.4 per cent compared to 72 per cent for females.”