Sunday 28th April 2024
Fulfilling its promise of creating employment opportunities in Nepal, the government launched the much-awaited Prime Minister Employment Program (PMEP)!
PM Oli inaugurated the milestone program at a special function held in City Hall, Kathmandu. The scheme will create a minimum of 100,000 jobs, annually!
The employment campaign seeks to create job opportunities within Nepal and end Nepal youth dependency on jobs abroad, said Oli.
“This is a new beginning, a new campaign. Among many problems of the country, unemployment is the major one, which is directly linked with poverty. This program aims to resolve both,” the Prime Minister added.
Unemployed persons between 18-51 years will be covered under this scheme, which will assign them jobs as per their qualification and interest areas. Additionally, they will also receive vocational and skill-oriented training.
With the implementation of the new program, an unemployed Nepali citizen will get employment for a minimum of 100 days in a fiscal year along with subsistence allowance worth 50 days of work.
As per the employment program, the selected youth will be categorized under community infrastructure development, information and communication technology, industry and health, large and national pride projects and reconstruction among other services.
The program implementation will begin after the government gets a count of the number of unemployed persons in Nepal.
According to the Labor, Employment and Social Security Ministry, the government will provision employment coordinators at all 753 local levels to facilitate the program.
2,259 candidates have been shortlisted to run the Employment Service Centers (ESCs) at all local units.
ESCs will now look for government projects that require people for project execution and completion.
Finance Minister Yuba Raj Khatiwada says that for the process to commence, certain amendments need to be made in line with the Public Procurement Act. He also added that both the local and the provincial governments should work together for implementation.
The employment coordinators will have to submit the names of unemployed to the government by June 25, 2019.
“Every month, the working age population increases by 35,000 people and Nepal must create 286,900 jobs a year to maintain its employment rate”, says a World Bank report.
Nepali Sansar applauds the government for this remarkable step towards addressing Nepal’s unemployment scenario.
