By IANS/EFE,
Madrid : The number of Spanish citizens out of work rose by 34,406 last month to 4.3 million, the highest level in 15 years, the labour ministry said.
The ranks of the unemployed grew by 167,056, or 4.01 percent during the 12 months ending March 31.
Unemployment was up last month in every sector. In absolute terms, the biggest increases were among people working in services, 14,836; and first-time job-seekers, 10,526.
The number of unemployed agricultural workers climbed by 5,698, or 4.14 percent.
Among immigrants, who now represent around 12 percent of Spain’s 47 million people, unemployment increased last month by 4.31 percent compared with March 2010, to reach 642,893.
The number of new employment contracts signed last month, 1.15 million, was down by 34,424 from March 2010, and only 111,118 of the March 2011 contracts were for permanent positions.
Registration with Social Security – often used as a proxy measure of employment – climbed in March by 45,660, its first advance in eight months, but remained 1.15 percent lower than at the same date in 2010.
Spain’s unemployment rate has long hovered around 20 percent, the highest in the 27-member European Union, as the Iberian nation continues to struggle under the impact of the recession and the collapse of a long-building real estate bubble.