ALGIERS — Algerian President
Abdelmadjid Tebboune
said Tuesday that the government would introduce youth unemployment benefits as
the North African nation struggles with a jobless rate of almost 15 percent.
اضافة اعلان
The payments will be made “to preserve the
dignity of young people”, Tebboune said in an interview broadcast on Algerian
television.
The allowance of 13,000 dinars ($92) —
equivalent to nearly two-thirds the minimum wage of 20,000 dinars ($142) — will
begin in March.
It will be accompanied by medical benefits,
while some taxes on consumer products will also be suspended, Tebboune said.
Algeria, Africa’s biggest gas exporter with
around 45 million people, earns some 90 percent of its state revenues from
hydrocarbons.
Tebboune said the youth payments were part of
the 2022 budget.
In November, lawmakers voted to scrap generous
state subsidies on basic goods that had long helped maintain social peace, but
that had strained state budgets as energy revenues fell.
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