The unemployment rate in the EU and the euro area decreased mildly in July and in Croatia it was between those two averages, sliding to its lowest level since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, shows a Eurostat report released on Wednesday.

The unemployment rate in the EU was 6.9% in July, going down from 7.1% in June while in the euro area it dropped from 7.8% to 7.6%.

The unemployment rate both in the EU and the euro area was the lowest since May 2020, when governments started introducing job-keeping measures due to the crisis caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

In July 2021, 14.613 million people in the EU were out of work, including 12.334 million in the euro area.

Compared to June, the number of job-seekers in the EU dropped by 430,000 and in the euro area it went down by 350,000. Compared to July 2020, the number of unemployed persons in the EU was down by 1.521 million and in the euro area it dropped by 1.336 million.

Croatia, Latvia and Lithuania with similar rates 

The highest unemployment rates in July were recorded by Greece and Spain, 14.6% and 14.3% respectively. They were the only EU countries with double-digit unemployment rates.

The unemployment rate in Croatia was 7.3%, a drop from 7.5% in June, and it was the lowest unemployment rate since March 2020 when the coronavirus started to spread. In February 2020, before the pandemic, the unemployment rate was 6.5%.

Latvia and Lithuania had similar unemployment rates in July, of 7.6 and 7.5% respectively.

A total of 128,000 Croatians were out of work in July, 4,000 fewer than in June. Compared to July 2020, the number of job-seekers was down by 26,000.

The lowest unemployment rate was reported by the Czech Republic, of 2.8%, followed by the Netherlands, with 3.1%. Malta and Poland reported unemployment rates of 3.3 and 3.4% respectively while Germany reported a rate of 3.6%.

In the age group under 25 the unemployment rate in the EU and the euro area in July was 0.7 percentage points lower than in June, at 16.2 and 16.5% respectively.