Cameroon’s Jobs Problem: 87% of Employment Is Informal
Cameroon’s latest comprehensive employment survey found that 86.6% of jobs were in the informal sector. This means that there is limited reach of formal employment across the country.
The finding comes from the National Institute of Statistics’ (INS) third Survey on Employment and the Informal Sector (EESI3), based on fieldwork conducted between May 10 and July 10, 2021, and published in 2023. The survey covered the national territory and successfully interviewed 8,738 households. This survey is still being used including in the 2025 report.
INS found that informal non-agricultural activities accounted for 52% of employment, while informal agriculture represented 34.7%. Public-sector employment accounted for 8.2%, compared with 5.1% for the formal private sector.
The regional picture varies sharply.
Informal employment reached 94.2% in both the Far North and North, followed by 91.6% in Adamawa and 91.2% in the Northwest. The rates were 89.1% in the East, 88% in Littoral excluding Douala, 87.5% in the West and 86.7% in the South.
The Centre excluding Yaoundé recorded 84.9%, while the rates were lower in Douala at 78.9% and Yaoundé at 75.9%. The Southwest recorded 70.1%, the lowest among the 12 survey areas.
Only 38.6% of employed people were wage earners, rising to 48.3% in urban areas and 64.6% in Yaoundé.
A separate INS survey of the informal sector found that only 6% of informal-sector workers were salaried, while 78.3% were own-account workers. Nearly half, 47.2%, worked more than 40 hours a week.
