According to the data released by the European Statistical Office Eurostat, the average unemployment rate registered in the Euro area reached 9.9% rate in April 2011, exactly the same percentage reached in March 2011. With regard to the unemployment rate in the whole EU, the rate was slightly lower -from 9.5% reached in March to 9.4% April.

Regarding the statistics by the Member States, the lowest unemployment rates were recorded in the Netherlands and Austria (both 4.2%) and Luxembourg (4.5%), and the highest in Spain (20.7%), Lithuania (17.3% in the fourth quarter of 2010) and Latvia (17.2% in the fourth quarter of 2010).

In addition, we can appreciate that the number of persons unemployed fell by 165,000 in the EU27 and by 115,000 in the euro area. Compared with April 2010, unemployment decreased by 702,000 in the EU27 and by 457,000 in the euro area. The statistics on unemployment by gender shows that between April 2010 and April 2011, the unemployment rate for males fell from 10.0% to 9.6% in the euro area and from 9.8% to 9.3% in the EU27. The female unemployment rate also decreased from 10.3% to 10.2% in the euro area and from 9.6% to 9.5% in the EU27.

Once again, Spain has the highest rate (44.4%) in youth unemployment (under-25s) followed by Greece, Slovakia and Lithuania. The lowest rates were observed in the Netherlands (6.9%), Germany (7.9%) and Austria (8.7%).