Key stakeholders from 50 countries came together in Washington, DC, September 15-16, 2008, for Making Cents International’s 2nd Global Youth Enterprise Conference. During two days of meetings, the new and growing international community working on youth enterprise, employment and livelihoods development shared their experiences on what holds potential, what is really working and how to measure success.
This publication covers the two major themes from the September conference: Market-Driven Approaches and Effective Methodologies and Practices for Monitoring, Evaluating, and Conducting Impact Assessments, and it also presents a chapter on Youth-Inclusive Financial Services. This chapter was developed with leaders from the youth-inclusive financial services sector who shared their expertise at the conference and in an in-depth training course, Youth-Inclusive Financial Services: Emerging Good Practices.
UCW Program and University of Galatasaray are organizing a two-day seminar to present recent research on child labour and its linkages with educational and youth employment outcomes. The seminar will also aim at identifying key information gaps relating to these themes, thereby helping to guide future research efforts.
The organizers are calling for papers relevant to the following themes for presentation at the seminar:
- Determinants of child labour and education
- Link between child labour and education
- Impact of child labour involvement on youth employment outcomes
- Labour market entry processes and school-to-work transitions.
Papers with a geographical focus on the Middle East are particularly encouraged.
This was one of the initial questions posed by Radha Rajkotia of the IRC as she began a recent presentation focused on the use of the sustainable livelihoods approach to improve the well-being of conflict-affected youth. The presentation was an element of a Washington Network for Children in Armed Conflict event and the question was far from unfounded.
To open the presentations, Felix Unogwu of Search for Common Ground silenced the crowd of over 50 attendees as each reflected on the stories of three conflict-affected young people. Though each demonstrated a sense hope, the comments of one young man from Liberia clearly illustrated the motivation for the event. When asked about his livelihood, the man took the inquiring practitioner into his home and pointed to a row of seven certificates on his wall. Each one was presented to him in recognition of his completion of a development-led effort to improve his livelihood. "I have seven certificates on my wall," he commented. "I have attended seven trainings. With all of this, I cannot provide for my family. I've lost self-respect."
Youth Unemployment in Conflict-Affected Areas, was organized in response to a growing recognition that, despite our best intentions, we as a community often fall short of providing youth the skills, knowledge or market connections necessary to pursue their own livelihoods and escape from poverty. The event centered on the presentation of two common approaches to this challenge - the sustainable livelihoods approach and the value chain approach. Through their comments and the questions and answers that followed, the presenters outlined the strengths and weaknesses of each approach in overcoming this challenge, a topic on which Jason Wolfe and others have commented in this forum.
Though I doubt anyone walked away with a magic bullet for improving employment among youth affected by conflict, many of us did gain a deeper understanding of these two distinct, yet surely connected schools of thought. We also realized that to translate this common ground into better programs, we have much work to do. Questions related to timing, targeting, scale, sequencing and prioritization were all largely left on the table. For our part, we will continue to monitor progress in this area and hope to work closely with some of those involved to deepen our collective understanding. In this regard, CYES would like to encourage further substantive exchanges among practitioners addressing youth unemployment regarding their experiences (successful or otherwise), available resources, or questions. Please do not hesitate to add your thoughts in the comments section or contact us by email at: moderators@cyesnetwork.org.
In the meantime, here are some links to relevant resources across the site, including the event presentations, of course:
Resources:
- Youth Unemployment in Crisis-Affected Areas: Event Presentations
- WNCAC Meeting Archive Center (Notes and all event presentations)
- Making Markets Work for Poor: Comparing M4P and SLA Frameworks
- Youth Livelihoods Development Program Guide
Activities:
