Tehran, Iran, October 22
By Mehdi Sepahvand –- Trend:
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has said unemployment is the biggest threat looming over the country.
Addressing a conference on National Day of Villagers and Nomads, Rouhani said the problem needs to be tackled,” IRIB news agency reported October 22.
The president underlined that his administration has fought rural unemployment by helping the agricultural sector. He also added that during the three years since he has taken over the office, agricultural output increased significantly, adding for example that Iran became self-sufficient in the production of wheat.
Rouhani also said that the government has done a lot to meet the convenience of rural population, stating that “Those who think the conditions of life in rural areas are different from those in urban areas are wrong.”
“However, we should answer the question why people migrate from villages to cities,” he stated, adding that unemployment rates in rural areas are alarming.
According to Rouhani, the Staff on Resistance Economy, headed by Vice President Es’haq Jahangiri, recently proposed to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei that $1.5 billion from the National Development Fund would go into rural employment projects.
In places around Iran, unemployment rate stands at 60 percent, according to the country's Interior Minister Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli.
He said June 6 that 11 million people live in slums across the country, three million of which live in Tehran, Mashhad, and Ahwaz.
According to his report, there are 2,700 slum areas in the whole country.
Based on the criteria of the International Labour Organization (ILO), unemployment rate in Iran is 11 percent, that is, 2.5 million unemployed people.