The National Bureau of Statistics NBS last week released a report showing that inflation and unemployment rates have hit 18.48 percent and 13.9 percent respectively, an indication that rate of crimes may also rise.

Stakeholders have however expressed apprehensions over the continued rise in the rate of unemployment and inflation in the country, which they argued portends danger both for the economy and the citizens.

The report shows that the rate of unemployment rose to 13.9 in the third quarter of the year compared to the 13.3 in the previous quarter.

According NBS, the total number of Nigerians not employed or under-employed was put at 27.12 million persons in the third quarter.

It was 26.06million in Q2 and 24.5 million in Q1 2016.

The agency in the report said working age population (persons within ages 15 and 64) rose to 108.03 per cent in Q3 compared to 106.69 million in Q2.

This represents a 1.26 per cent increase over the previous quarter and a 3.57 per cent increase when compared to Q3 2015.

The labour force population, mainly those willing and actively looking for work increased to 80.67 million from 79.9 million in Q2 2016.

The report added, “This is a marginal increase of 0.4 percentage points between quarters two and three of 2016, and shows a steady rise in the rate since Q3 of 2015.

During the review period, the number of unemployed in the labour market increased by 554,311 persons.

Accordingly, there were a total of 27.12 million persons in the Nigerian labour market in Q3 2016 that were either unemployed or underemployed compared to 26.06million in Q2 and 24.5 million in Q1 2016.”

It was also gathered that the inflation in the country has hit as much as 18.48 per cent as at November as against 18.33 in the month of October.

The rise in inflation was attributed to the 0.15 per cent increase in headline index that has affected all the divisions which determine inflation.

The NBS report also indicate that the highest increase was in housing, water, electricity, gas and other articles, including passenger transport fare.

The bureau also said the Food Sub Index also increased by 17.19 per cent (year-on-year) in November, by 0.10 per cent from 17.09 per cent in October.

According to the Consumer Price Index CPI figures for the period under review, major food sub-indexes increased with soft drinks recording the slowest pace of increase at 7.76 per cent year on year.

The NBS stated, “The average annual rate of change of the food sub-index for the twelve- month period ending in November 2016 over the previous 12-month average was 14.39 per cent (0.57 per cent) points from the average annual rate of change recorded in October (13.82 per cent).

“All Items less Farm Produce’’ or Core sub-index, which excludes the prices of volatile agricultural produce increased by 18.20 per cent during the month, 0.10 percentage points lower from the rate (18.10) recorded in

October as all key divisions which contributes to the index increased.

“On a month-on-month basis, the core sub-index rose by 0.71 per cent in November, down by 0.04 percentage points from the 0.75 per cent recorded in October.

Recall that the rates of unemployment in 2015 were lower.

For instance, it was 12.1 per cent in Q1; 10.4 per cent in Q4 2015 and 9.9 per cent in Q3 2015.

Expers warn that unless proactive measures were urgently taken, the rate of crims might be on the increase.