LINCOLN -- Nebraska officials say the state’s unemployment rate has risen 1.3 percentage points over the last year to hit 4.3 percent in January -- still far short of the national rate of 7.6 percent.

Gage County’s unemployment rate is well above the state average with a 7.2 percent unemployment rate in January, according to state unemployment figures. In December it was 6.1 percent.

“We’re still trying to find the positive side of what’s going on,” Lori Warner, Beatrice Area Chamber of Commerce president, said.

Beatrice Mayor Dennis Schuster said it was unfortunate to see unemployment rise in Beatrice and Gage County.

In December and January, Schuster noted that the community likely  was affected by local lay-offs from industries, including those jobs lost at  Irwin Tools, and industries not hiring as many seasonal workers, as compared in the past.

“This is a small labor pool,” Schuster said. “It doesn’t take a lot to make a big increase.”

Nebraska’s January figure is four-tenths of a point higher than the revised 3.9 percent December figure. The state Department of Labor report in late January gave a preliminary December figure of 4 percent, compared with the revised November figure of 3.7 percent.

Since 1976, the report said, Nebraska’s highest January rate was the 6.8 percent recorded in 1983.

Unemployment grew 9.3 percent during January and employment dropped 1.5 percent, the report said.

On Wednesday, Labor Department spokeswoman Terri Johnston said an estimated 14,345 people lost jobs in Nebraska during January. She said the estimate was compiled from the department’s monthly employer survey and farm and nonfarm data from census records.

Nebraska’s January rate of 4.3 percent is 3.3 percentage points lower than the national rate of 7.6 percent.

Nebraska Labor Commissioner Catherine Lang said the state’s economic indicators, including unemployment, “are slower to react to the national circumstances.”

“The industry mix is diverse enough to help employees transfer their working skills from one industry to another when a slowdown occurs,” Lang said.

For Lincoln, January’s estimated unemployment rate jumped 1.4 percentage points, to 4.8 percent from December’s revised figure of 3.4 percent. The rate was 3.3 percent in January 2008.

For Omaha, the estimated January rate of 5.2 percent was 1.1 points higher than the 4.1 percent in December. The rate was 3.9 percent in January 2008.

Omaha and Lincoln unemployment rates are not seasonally adjusted and are not compared with the state unemployment rate.

The January unemployment figures ranged from a low of 4.5 percent in the central part of Nebraska to a high of 5.8 percent in southeast Nebraska.

-- The Associated Press contributed to this report.