Unemployment in Flanders continues to increase, with figures from VDAB showing that in 2024, unemployment was almost consistently higher than the previous year and this trend persists into 2025.
At the end of January, there were 214,869 job seekers in Flanders, an increase of 4,500 people or 2% compared to January 2024.
Just over half (52%) of these job seekers are receiving or applying for unemployment benefits.
Around 42% are former non-working individuals, such as those receiving sickness benefits, and 5 percent are young people in vocational integration periods. The latter category saw the strongest increase, rising by 6%.
More than half of all job seekers, totalling 120,048, are considered to have “a long distance from the labor market,” according to VDAB.
Their chances of finding a job within six months are relatively low, often due to health or welfare issues that need to be addressed first.
The unemployment rate in Flanders is now 6.8%, compared to 6.7% in January of the previous year, according to VDAB.
