"In the ministry's estimate, taking account of the demographic factor and seasonal fluctuations, a rise in the number of registered unemployed people will continue throughout 2004 to reach 1.7 million people on the year's average," reads the ministerial monitoring published on Wednesday.
In July the official number of unemployed was 2.2 percent of the gainfully employed, or 1.57 million in comparison with 1.53 million people in July last year.
Simultaneously, the numbers of unemployed calculated according to the International Labor Organization methods reached 5.2 million by late July, or 7.1 percent of the gainfully employed population. In comparison with July 2003, the total decreased by 577,000 people. The ministerial forecast says the number will also increase before the year's end.
"With account for the economic growth forecast in conditions of a sizeable increase in the able-bodied population, a certain rise in the scope of unemployment is expected before the end of this year [according to the ILO methods]," the report goes on to read.
At the same time, the earlier forecast said that unemployment would go down in 2005 to 2007: "The general unemployment level during the forecasted period will somewhat decline in the majority of mostly underdeveloped regions [from 11.6 percent in 2003 to 11.2 percent in 2005 and 10.9 percent in 2007]."
In the figures of the Russian Statistics Agency, the number of Russia's gainfully employed population was 72.9 million in the end of July 2004, or 50% of the total.
