Honduras

1.Series

Title:

Starting year:

The placement services exist since 1980; the statistical series started in 1987.

2.Agency making the initial registrations of unemployed persons

Name of the agency:

Servicio de Colocación de la Dirección General de Empleo (Employment Exchange Service of the General Department of Employment).

Type of agency:

Public service under a national authority, with local offices.

Name of the national authority:

Labour and Social Security Department.

Location of the local offices making the registrations:

In the three main cities of the country, covering the central and northern areas.

Type of services provided/administered by the agency:

Assisting job-seekers to find jobs;

Assisting job-seekers to establish their own business (applies only to disabled persons);

Assisting employers to find workers;

Vocational guidance;

Job-related training (the employment service sends people to the Institute of Vocational Training, but does not train them directly).

Percentage of job-seekers seeking work through the agency:

3,4% of the number of urban unemployed according to the Multiple Purpose Household Survey.

3.The following information is registered about a person:

Name;

Sex;

Social security number (or similar identification number also used by other agencies);

Address of usual residence;

Date of birth;

Nationality;

Educational/vocational attainment, with four categories distinguished. Links to ISCED have not been established;

Current/past activity status, with three categories distinguished;

Type of work (occupation) of past or present job, with three possible responses. Links to ISCO-88 have been established at the major group level (disaggregation at four digits);

Type of work (occupation) of job sought, for which the number of possible responses varies according to the job-seeker. The most frequently it is two categories per job-seeker. Links to ISCO-88 have been established at the major group level (disaggregation at four digits);

Name and address of immediate chief or present or previous work place;

Previous registrations with the agency/service;

Other: physical characteristics (size and weight); family status (number of members, children, whether head of family or not); owner of car, or not; type of driving licence; migration (local or external); disability.

4.Criteria used for inclusion of a person in the registers (R) and/or the statistics of unemployed persons (S):

Being without work (R);

Seeking work (R);

Availability for work (R);

Age (lower limit: 16 years with a minors’ work permit; no upper limit) (R);

Being resident in the country (R).

5.Criteria used for exclusion of a person from the registers (R) and/or the statistics of unemployed persons (S):

Death (R);

Taking up residency abroad (R);

Commencement of a (new) job (R);

Participation in an employment promotion scheme, public works programme, etc (R);

Studying or undergoing training incompatible with working hours(R);

Failure to contact the agency/service during five consecutive years (R);

Inability to work (indicated by the person concerned) (R).

Note: The information above is registered as marginal notes in the person’s file, archived and eliminated only in case of death; in all other cases, the information is kept. The limit for keeping registers is five years.

6.Definition of unemployed persons used for the statistics

This category groups together persons who are affected by so called "open" unemployment, meaning those who have been laid off (i.e. persons who were employed, but had lost their employment for whatever reason, and had actively looked for another job during the reference week, or who had tried to create their own business or agricultural operation) and first job seekers. Job-seekers include unemployed persons who have been laid off, first job seekers, and to a lesser extent employed persons who are looking for a better work opportunity, because they have reached a new skills level or because they desire a higher salary.

7.Updating of the registers

The registers are updated every six months.

8.Unemployment rates

Statistics from the registers are not used to obtain unemployment rates.

9.Type of statistics of unemployed persons produced

Reference period:

Year.

Frequency of production:

Yearly.

Descriptive variables used:

Sex;

Age;

Educational level;

Occupation;

Industry;

Geographic characteristics;

Other: occupational status.

Form of publication:

For internal use only;

Machine-readable form, on request.

Agency responsible for publication:

General Department of Employment.

Title and periodicity of the publication(s):

Boletín Estadístico (Statistical Bulletin), yearly.

10.Methodological information about the statistics

Form of release:

Not released, available for internal use only;

In machine-readable form, on request.

Agency responsible for the release:

General Department of Employment.

11.Comparisons with unemployment statistics from other sources

Comparisons have been made with unemployment statistics from the household survey as well as from the population census.

Frequency of the comparisons:

From time to time (latest year: 2001); depending on the periodicity of the publication of the household survey, once or twice a year.

Publication of the methodology/results of the comparisons:

They are published in the Statistical Bulletin and are used as references in analyses on this topic.

12.Major changes since the start of the statistics

There have been no major changes in legislation, capacity of the agency and/or administrative procedures which had a significant influence on the statistics.

However, there has been a change in the method of data entry due to the establishment of an electronic employment exchange, which has contributed to improving mediation services. It is planned to extend this to other cities in the country integrating also employers’ organizations through this electronic system.