The Quinte region saw serious gains on employment in the month of December.
According to Statistic Canada’s labour force report from last month, unemployment in the Belleville metropolitan area, which covers Belleville, Quinte West, Tyendinaga-Deseronto and Stirling-Rawdon, fell 2.5% from 7.9% down to 5.4%.
Ontario also saw a drop in its unemployment rate falling to 6% from 6.4%.
Statistics Canada says the economy added 55,000 jobs in December before COVID-19 cases began spiking at the end of the month.
The agency says in its labour force survey, the increase in the number of people working came as the unemployment rate edged down to 5.9% compared with 6.0% in November.
It was the lowest unemployment rate since February 2020 before the pandemic when it was 5.7%.
The overall increase in jobs in December was due to a gain in full-time jobs of 123,000, while part-time employment fell by 68,000 for the month.
With files from The Canadian Press.
