5 ways to tackle the youth jobs crisis

Persistent jobless growth has reached crisis proportions,
especially among the world’s young. The numbers are stark: in
2012, six out of 10 workers aged 15-29 lacked stable
employment and earned below-average wages, according to the
International Labour Organization. The global youth employment
rate has reached 13.1% – almost three times that of adults.
But, while substantive intervention is necessary to tackle a
problem of such massive proportions, there’s no silver bullet
solution. My NGO, JA Worldwide, recently produced a report,
Generation Jobless , detailing both causes of and potential
answers to the problem.
Our conclusions: a toxic mix of factors has contributed to the
crisis, from mushrooming youth populations in developing
regions to a growing mismatch between the skills people have
and those that employers need. Addressing the world’s youth
unemployment challenge requires a multipronged, long-term
effort involving multiple stakeholders, such as governments,
employers, educational institutions and civil-society
organizations – as well as families, communities and peer
groups.
There are five basic strategies that could be pursued globally:
1. Boosting job creation and labour demand
2. Better preparing young people for the job market
3. Illuminating pathways to productive work
4. Improving financial well-being, both current and
long-term
5. Fostering entrepreneurship
Governments, for example, should develop national action plans
targeting youth employment. They should establish enterprise
incubation programmes and infrastructure projects that hire and
train young people. They should also incentivize education
institutions and private operators to do the same.
Employers can create entry-level job opportunities, implement
school-to-work apprenticeships and on-the-job training
programmes, as well as support young entrepreneurs through
mentoring. Educational institutions can incorporate
entrepreneurship into the curriculum and work with employers to
ensure they offer students the appropriate training.
At JA, our own approach rests on a heavy dose of collaboration.
We work in more than 120 countries through over 450,000
volunteer teachers and mentors, who provide experiential
learning to young people between the ages of five and 25. Some
3,000 JA employees work closely with educators, policy-makers
and corporations to design programmes for young people in their
countries. Most of these efforts are aimed at providing youth
with hands-on experiences in entrepreneurship, financial literacy
and workplace readiness.
A case in point is the innovative ITS TYME (Immersion Training
Strategy: Targeting Young Marginalized Entrepreneurs) initiative
in sub-Saharan Africa. Working with corporations, government
agencies, other local and international NGOs and individual
philanthropists, the programme takes entrepreneurship training
out of the classroom and into African marketplaces, motor parks,
slums and other centres of youth activity. It‘s all focused on
equipping underprivileged young people with the practical,
strategic and tactical tools they need to become financially self-
sufficient and contribute to the social, economic and political life
of their communities. In 2013, ITS TYME facilitated over 500
start-ups and 300 mentoring relationships, with notable
improvement in incomes across all four project communities.
Consider Tanzania, where, as in other communities, JA’s
partners provide technical and vocational training, as well as
seed capital, to people trying to start businesses. Through a
partnership with Asylum Access and UNHCR/Tanzania, for
example, a group of young urban refugees successfully raised
capital to start a poultry production company. They found their
initial financing of $82 over a period of four months – a major
feat for young people whose average daily income is less than
35 cents.
In Latin America and the Caribbean, another noteworthy
programme, called Women for Development, was co-developed
with the Citi Foundation. It links entrepreneurship education and
access to finance through local microfinance institutions, helping
participants to improve their financial lives and, in turn,
strengthen their communities. Since 2011, more than 5,000
women have benefited.
Mery Mercedes, who lives in the Dominican Republic, is one of
those success stories. Unemployed when she started the
programme, by the end she was able to launch her own business
selling perishable goods. A year and a half later, the enterprise
continues to grow steadily. What’s more, she recently qualified
for a bank loan after being turned away before.
These experiences carry a clear lesson: that only through the
concerted efforts of several parties – and a willingness to stick
with it over the long-term – can we address the world’s youth
unemployment challenge and achieve lasting change.