UN Tweeted That Equipping Young People With Skills For Employment is More Important Than Ever.

In 2014, the United Nations General Assembly declared 15 July as World Youth Skills Day, to celebrate the strategic importance of equipping young people with skills for employment, decent work, and entrepreneurship. Since then, World Youth Skills Day has provided a unique opportunity for dialogue between young people, technical and vocational education and training (TVET) institutions, firms, employers’ and workers’ organizations, policy-makers, and development partners.

World Youth Skills Day 2022 takes place amid concerted efforts toward socio-economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic that are interconnected with challenges such as climate change, conflict, persisting poverty, rising inequality, rapid technological change, demographic transition, and others.

Young women and girls, young persons with disabilities, youth from poorer households, rural communities, indigenous peoples, and minority groups, as well as those who suffer the consequences of violent conflict and political instability, continue to be excluded due to a combination of factors. In addition, the crisis has accelerated several transitions the world of work was already undergoing, which add layers of uncertainty regarding the skills and competencies that will be in demand after the pandemic is overcome.

Recent estimates suggest that 600 million jobs would have to be created over the next 15 years to meet youth employment needs. The proportion of young people not in employment, education, or training (the youth NEET rate) has remained stubbornly high over the past 15 years and now stands at 30 percent for young women and 13 percent for young men worldwide.
Enterprises and organizations brought skills development almost to a standstill due to lockdown measures introduced during the pandemic. The training was interrupted for 86 percent of apprentices and 83 percent of interns/trainees. Nearly half of the enterprises have stopped paying stipends or wages to apprentices, interns, and trainees.
The youth population will grow by more than 78 million between 2021 and 2030. Low-income countries will account for nearly half of that increase. Education and training systems need to respond to this challenge.

Entrepreneurial learning for TVET institutions helps TVET institutions to focus on what really drives entrepreneurial learning by providing the tools to assess the needs of the target group and the framework to explore the added value of an entrepreneurial learning ecosystem.

Over To You:
Young people are drivers of change and must be fully engaged in decisions affecting their future.