Colombia’s February unemployment was the lowest for this month since 2017. According to data from the National Administrative Department of Statistics (DANE), unemployment last February stood at 10.3%, which corresponds to a decrease of 1.3% compared to the figure recorded in the same period of 2024.
Unemployment in Colombia fell in February to figures not seen since 2017
Unemployment in Colombia fell in February to 10.3%, a decrease of 1.3% compared to the same month last year. In addition, in the last month, the decrease in the number of unemployed was 267,000 people.
Piedad Urdinola, director of DANE, highlighted that these data not only consolidate the good moment that the labor market is experiencing in the country, which manages to maintain around 10% the unemployment rate for several months, but they are the lowest for a month of February in the last eight years.
Of the total working age population (40.4 million people over 15 years of age), 23.4 million are already employed, 977,000 more than in February 2024. With these data, the unemployed population stood at 2.7 million people in February.
However, not all the news is positive, as informal employment is rising at the same rate as overall job growth. In February, the informality rate—representing jobs without formal contracts, benefits, or legal protections—reached 57.6%, marking a slight increase of 0.6% compared to the same month last year.
The cities with the highest informality rates during the second month of the year were: Sincelejo, Valledupar, Riohacha, Quibdo and Popayan. The cities with the lowest informality rates were: Manizales, Pereira, Bogota, Medellin and Tunja.
Construction and the public sector, which generated the most jobs
Construction and public administration, defense, education and health care activities were the main contributors to the increase in employment in February, generating more than 210,000 jobs each, which meant an increase of 7.2% and 12.1%, respectively.
As for the employment gender bias, it is noteworthy that the construction industry hired 207,000 men and 12,000 women, while in public administration the hiring of women (143,000) doubled that of men (75,000).
In contrast, artistic, entertainment, recreational and other activities lost 112,000 employees and offset 0.5% of the variation in the second month of the year. A similar behavior was shown by real estate activities, with 69,000 fewer people employed, which represents a 0.3% decrease.
In addition, DANE pointed out that self-employed workers were the ones with the highest contribution by occupational position. With this, in February, 10.02 million people were self-employed, which contributed 3% to the variation of employed persons.
By cities, those with the lowest unemployment rates were: Medellin, Villavicencio, Neiva, Santa Marta and Cartagena. On the other hand, the capitals with the highest unemployment rates during the second month of the year were: Quibdo, Riohacha, Florencia, Ibague and Cucuta.
#Mercadolaboral 📚 En febrero de 2025, la tasa de desocupación se ubicó en 10,3%, una variación estadísticamente significativa frente a febrero de 2024, cuando fue del 11,7%.
Durante el mismo periodo, de los últimos ocho años, febrero de 2025 registra la tasa de desocupación más… pic.twitter.com/XYFGsJQc8Q— DANE Colombia (@DANE_Colombia) March 31, 2025
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