The unemployment rate in the European Union (EU), the euro area and Croatia in November dropped to its lowest level since March 2020 and the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, according to a report by Eurostat released on Monday.

The European Union’s unemployment rate, measured by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) methodology, in November fell by 0.2 percentage points compared to the month before, to 6.5 percent. In the euro area, it slid by 0.1 percentage point to 7.2 percent.

In both areas, the joblessness rate thus reached its lowest level since March 2020, when Covid-19 started spreading across the world.

According to Eurostat, there were 13.984 million unemployed persons in the EU in November 2021, including 11.829 million in the euro area.

Compared to October 2021, their number declined by 247,000 in the EU and by 222,000 in the euro area. Compared to November 2020, the number of unemployed persons decreased by 1.659 million in the EU and by 1.411 million in the euro area.

In November 2021, Spain and Greece were the only EU countries to record a double-digit unemployment rate, of 14.1% and 13.4% respectively.

Croatia’s unemployment rate, measured by the ILO methodology, dropped to 7.1% from a revised 7.3% in October. An earlier estimate for October indicated an unemployment rate of 7 percent.

That is the lowest unemployment rate since the outbreak of coronavirus in March 2020, when it was 6.5%. In the February before the pandemic it was 5.9%.

In November, Croatia thus ranked alongside Finland and Latvia, which had an unemployment of 7.2% and 7.3% respectively.

There were 127,000 unemployed persons in Croatia in November, according to Eurostat, or 4,000 fewer than in October. Compared to November 2020, their number decreased by 26,000.

The lowest unemployed rate in November was registered by the Czech Republic, of 2.2%. It was followed by the Netherlands (2.7%), Poland (3%) and Germany (3.2%).