The unemployment rate for Abbotsford-Mission dropped 0.3 per cent from May to June, but is much higher than Vancouver according to numbers released Friday by Statistics Canada.
Abbotsford-Mission's unemployment rate fell to 8.6 per cent in June from 8.9 per cent the month previous, while the participation rate remained unchanged.
Mission's economic development officer, Stacey Crawford, said the decline is an indicator that the economy is rebounding.
Unemployment is down 1.5 per cent from December 2010, but up 0.2 per cent from last June.
Those rates are also relatively high compared to Vancouver, which dropped to 7.2 per cent in June from 7.6 per cent the month previous.
But Crawford said the numbers are an ongoing reflection of the post-Olympics lull for Fraser Valley businesses who service the Vancouver area.
The lead-up to the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver provided significant employment to construction and transport companies in the Fraser Valley, said Crawford, and that cooled off as the work was completed.
Because of that, British Columbia was one of the last regions in Canada to be impacted by the global economic downturn, meaning some regions of the province have rebounded slower.
In the interior, Kelowna's unemployment rate rose 0.2 per cent to 8.5 per cent. On the island, Victoria remained steady at 6.2 per cent.
Overall, British Columbia dropped to 7.3 per cent from 7.6 per cent, almost exactly the same as the national average.