S.Africa's jobless rate at 24.0 percent in Q4

South Africa's official jobless rate fell to 24.0 percent of the labour force in the fourth quarter of 2010, from 25.3 percent in the third quarter, a report showed on Tuesday.

In its latest quarterly Labour Force Survey, Statistics South Africa said the total number of unemployed people stood at 4.137 million in the three months to December from 4.396 million in the third quarter.

The expanded definition of unemployment, which includes people who have stopped looking for work, decreased to 35.8 percent from 36.4 percent.