By Angela Gemmill

The unemployment rate in Sudbury shot up last month.

According to Statistics Canada, the local jobless rate sits at 6.3 %, compared to 5.9 % in January.

On a national level, the economy lost 1,000 net job in February, which StatCan says increased the unemployment rate 0.2 percentage points to 6.8 %.

Many economists had been expecting to see the negative effects of the plunge in oil prices surface in the February data.