South Africa's unemployment hits 14-year high as recession looms

A man pulls a trolley full of recyclable waste material which he sells for a living, in Daveland near Soweto, South Africa August 4, 2015. (Photo: Reuters)

South Africa's unemployment rose to its highest in 14 years in the first quarter as agriculture and informal sectors shed jobs and more people stopped looking for work, data showed on Thursday, in a sign the economy may be headed for recession.

The unemployment rate climbed to 27.7 percent of the labour force in the first quarter, the highest since September 2003, from 26.5 percent in the last quarter of 2016.