LJUBLJANA, Feb 9 (Reuters) - The number of unemployed people in Slovenia rose by 15.6 percent year-on-year in January, the National Employment Service reported and analysts said it will continue rising through the first half of 2011.
In January, the number of jobless rose to 115,132, an increase of 4.6 percent from December, the service said on Wednesday.
The unemployment rate will be published by the statistics office in March. The rate reached 11.1 percent in November when there were 103,831 unemployed.
"The first half of the year will in Slovenia be marked by strategic problems of the financial sector and weak labour market," Simon Kranjc from KD Banka told Reuters.
The government's macroeconomic institute said last week Slovenia's economic recovery was burdened by poor local credit conditions, which worsened in 2010 compared to 2009, as non-financial institutions repaid more bank loans that they received. [ID:nLDE71116Q].
Slovenia was badly hit by the global crisis due to its dependency on exports; its economy shrank 8.1 percent in 2009. The government expects economy to expand by 2.5 percent this year from a growth of about 1 percent in 2010.
But Kranjc said this year's growth is expected to be lower than forecast by the government and will amount to 2.2 percent. (Reporting by Marja Novak; Editing by Ron Askew)