KUWAIT, Nov 14 2009 The population Kuwait’s was 3.4 million at the end of June 2009, the same figure recorded later last year, the National Bank of Kuwait (NBK) has said in its recent economic report.
Kuwaiti nationals in the population were numbered as 1.1 million, making up 32%, and foreign residents were 2.3 million, the repot said, quoting figures of the Public Authority for Civil Information (PACI).
The number of Kuwaiti nationals have roughly rose by 15,000, but that of non-Kuwaitis fell by around 14,000, keeping the country’s total population unchanged, the report indicated.
Although the drop in the number of foreign residents is surely the outgrowth of the global financial crisis, the percentage did not exceed one percent.
However, the number of non-Kuwaitis is now still 50,000, or two percent, higher than the figure reported a couple of years ago, the report showed.
The number of workers in Kuwait totaled 1.7 million late June, down 13,000, or 2.6 percent, in the first half of 2009 on a daily basis, it added.
The drop mainly involved foreign residents. But, at the same time, the number of Kuwaiti workers edged up by 10,000, or three percent, the NBK-s released report said.
The fall in the number of workers was mainly in the private sector, while, in fact, the number went up by in the public sector Unemployed Kuwaitis nosedived to 14,265, late June, taking joblessness rate down to 4.9 percent, the report added.