Employees
21. Aug 2026
31,100 employees in July — 500 more than last year
The number of employees continues to increase, but in recent years the growth has weakened. This is shown by the trend, which describes developments after removing seasonal variations and other random changes.
In July, there were 31,102 employees in the Faroe Islands. This is 505 employees (1.7%) more than in the same month last year..
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There were just over 16,000 men and 15,000 women among employees in July. Compared with the same month last year, the increase was larger among men, with almost 400 more men. There were over 100 more women.
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Eight per cent do not have long-term residency
To qualify as a long-term resident, an individual must have resided in the Faroes for either half of their life or for a total of 7 out of 10 consecutive years at some point in their life. In July, there were 2,343 employees who did not have long-term residency. This is just under 8% of the total number of employees. Compared with the same month last year, there were 268 people, or 13%, more this year. A larger share of the increase in employees therefore came from people without long-term residency.
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The largest group of employees without long-term residency have Asian citizenship. These are especially from Southeast Asia. This group has grown steadily in recent years, and over the last five years their share of employees without long-term residency has increased from 20% to more than 40%.
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Both male and female employees without long-term residency most often come from Asia, which in total were 980 employees in July. Of these, the distribution was 61% men and 39% women. The largest gender difference among employees without long-term residency is among those from Eastern Europe, where there are almost three times as many men as women.
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The economic activity with the largest number of employees without long-term residency is "Manufacturing", where there were 726 employees in July, corresponding to just over 30% of all employees without long-term residency. A more detailed breakdown shows that most of these, three quarters, worked in ‘Manufacture of food products’, and 270 of these in ‘Processing of demersal fish’.
In terms of the number of employees without long-term residency, the second-largest economic activity in July was ‘Accommodation and food service activities’, with 320 employees, followed by ‘Construction’ with 270 employees and ‘Wholesale and retail trade; Repair of motor vehicles and motorcycles’ with 240 employees.
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About the employee statistics
The employee statistics covers persons aged 13 years or older, resident in the Faroe Islands, who in the month receive wages subject to A-tax (taxes deducted directly from income), corresponding to 4 hours per month or more through the pay-as-you-earn (PAYE) tax system. In addition, persons in temporary absence (e.g., illness and parental leave) are also included, even if they receive wages or not.
Statistics on employees and jobs follow the guidelines in the manuals on employees and jobs from the International Labour Organization (ILO) under the United Nations.
Definitions:
- Employee (main job) is the total number of persons in a job. The job is based on where the person receives the highest pay from. A person is counted only once.
- Long-term residency is intended to describe whether a person has lived a certain number of years in the Faroe Islands at some point in their life. A person has long-term residency in the Faroe Islands if they have either lived in the Faroe Islands for half of their life, or for a total of 7 out of 10 consecutive years at some point in their life. See more about long-term residency on the theme page.
- Citizenship is grouped into continents and areas. If the citizenship includes several countries within the same realm, the citizenship is based on the country that has the most inhabitants in the realm. For example, Greenland is grouped under Northern Europe because they have Danish citizenship, even though geographically it belongs to North America.
- Employer's main activity is based on where the wages paid come from. An employer is classified into a main (economic) activity according to where the greatest activity is registered. In cases where a person receives wages from several employers, the main activity is assigned to the employer that has paid the largest amount. The main activity is not necessarily the same as the actual activity the person works in, since an employer may have several activities. The main activity is based on the international classification NACE rev. 2. The first and second levels of the classification are directly comparable. At the third level, a few selected sub-activities are further split in order to describe Faroese conditions as well as possible.