Bulgaria's jobless rate up to 4.9% in January

Bulgaria's unemployment rate edged up to 4.9% in January from a 4.8% in December, as the Omicron variant of the coronavirus hit the country, data from the state employment agency showed on Tuesday.

The jobless rate was 7% in January 2021, when the Balkan country was imposing tougher restrictions to curb the spread of COVID-19.

There were about 5,000 more unemployed people in the country of 7 million than a month earlier. When compared with the year before, there were 67,400 fewer unemployed Bulgarians.

More than 2,400 people started work through government-sponsored programmes in December, while over 42,000 people kept their jobs through government schemes designed to help employers through the pandemic.

(Reporting by Tsvetelia Tsolova)