Unemployment
25. Feb 2025
Unemployment at 1% in January
Unemployed people are registered as unemployed with the Faroese unemployment system and the social welfare services, fully available to the labour market and actively seeking work.
The Faroese unemployment rate reached 1% in January 2025, down 0.1% from January 2024.
[px-graph-1]
A full-time unemployed person is defined as one who is unemployed throughout a full month. If two persons are affected by unemployment for half a month each, they are converted to one full-time unemployed person for the month in question.
In January, 318 people were full-time unemployed, a decrease of 20 compared with January 2024. 374 people were affected by unemployment, which is 36 less than in January 2024.
[px-graph-2]
Lower unemployment rate for women
There were 118 full-time unemployed women in January, equivalent to 0.8%. This is a year-on-year decrease of 0.2 percentage point. There were 200 full-time unemployed men in January 2025, equivalent to 1.2%, which is unchanged from January 2024.
[px-graph-3]
Lowest unemployment in Sandoy
The map below shows unemployment rates by region. In January, the Sandoy region had the lowest unemployment rate at 0.5%, down from 1.4% in January 2024. Norðstreymoy had the highest rate at 1.3%.
More regional statistics on unemployment are found here: Norðoya region, Eysturoyar region, Norðstreymoyar region, Suðurstreymoyar region, Vága region, Sandoyar region, Suðuroyar region
[px-graph-4]
Highest unemployment in 25-34 age group
The highest unemployment rate in January was registered in the 25-34 age group at 1.6%, which is the same figure as in January 2024. The lowest rate (0.8%) was registered in the 16-24 and 45-54 age groups. The biggest year-on-year change was registered in the 16-24 age group, which saw a year-on-year increase of 0.4 percentage point.
[px-graph-5]
11,5% are long-term unemployed
The graph below shows how long people have been affected by unemployment. The largest group of unemployed people in January (111 persons, or 30% of all unemployed people) were those who have been out of work for between 30 and 89 days.
In January, 43 people (11.5% of all unemployed people) were long-term unemployed. This means that they have been out of work for more than a year (365+ days). The number of long-term unemployed people increased by 12 since January 2024, when the proportion of long-term unemployed people stood at below 8%.
[px-graph-6]
Unemployment as a concept
Statistics Faroe Islands and other statistics agencies across the world use the definitions of unemployment given by the International Labour Organisation (ILO), which is a United Nations agency.
According to this definition, the unemployment rate reflects the proportion of the labour force that does not have a job, is available to the labour market and is actively looking for work.
In the monthly unemployment reports from Statistics Faroe Islands, unemployed people are defined as those who are registered as unemployed with the Faroese unemployment system and the social welfare services and who meet the above definition of unemployment. Unemployment reports from Statistics Faroe Islands only cover people aged 16-66.
For international comparisons, see Labour force survey.