International labour office geneva

Figure 5: Unemployment rate among educated persons (%) - (1994-2007) * 

23.8

23

16

15.2

14.5

16.1

15.3

16.8

18.6

17.4

14.8

14.1

12.3

0

5

10

15

20

25

1994

1995

1997

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

U

ne

m

pl

oy

m

e

nt

 R

a

te

 be

tw

e

e

n E

duc

a

te

d 

P

e

rs

ons

 

 

* Source: Egypt Information Portal/ IDSC referring to data from CAPMAS, 2008, The figures does not include emigrants.  

http://www.eip.gov.eg/nds/nds_view.aspx?id=4975

 

The high rate of unemployment explains the high tendency to migrate among 

educated people, as shown in Table 7. This has also been confirmed by recent research 

identifying a gap between labour supply and demand and that the unemployed in Egypt do 

not fit the labour demand, hence deepening the issue of unemployment (Radwan, 2002). 

The problem is deeply rooted in the education system that has focused on quantity and paid 

less attention to quality of education and its ability to meet market requirements (Galal, 

2002). 

Table 7: Educational level of migrants and non-migrants at last emigration (migrants) or five years ago