World Youth Skills Day 2019: Over 500,000 Unemployed Youth in Nepal

The world celebrates World Youth Skills Day today. The day is observed to encourage youth in celebrating the power of their skills and training required for their own success and fulfillment to make valuable contributions to family, community, nation and to the international community.

World Youth Skills Day History

The UN General Assembly adopted a resolution on December 18, 2014 to introduce World Youth Skills Day. It was started by Sri Lanka with support from other Asian developing nations, also known as G-77. The UN General Assembly then declared July 15, 2015 as World Youth Skills Day with consensus from all member countries.

World Youth Skills 2019 Goal

Today, the goal of World Youth Skills Day is to achieve better socio-economic conditions for youth and identify ways to address unemployment and underemployment in developing and Least Developed Countries (LDCs).

The theme for this year is Learning to Learn for Life and Work.

Nepal’s Employment Scenario 2019

According to Nepal Labor Force Survey 2018-19, Nepal’s current unemployment rate is 11.4 percent. Following are the statistics on Nepal’s unemployed youth:

• Of the total Nepali unemployed youth, 511,000 are males and 397,00 females
• The unemployment rate for males in 10.3 percent and 13.1 percent for females
• Nepal has a high rate of Labor under utilization, which is 32 percent for males and 48.8 percent for females
• The work wage for men in Nepal is NPR 17, 809 per month and NPR 13, 630 for women, which is a difference of NPR 5,834
• Most employment opportunities in Nepal are available in the agriculture, forestry, fisheries, retail and wholesale businesses
• The percentage of Nepali women in high-level jobs is low 2 percent as men occupy 86.8 percent managerial level jobs
• Every year, 300,000 Nepalis migrate to foreign destinations for jobs
• Only 47 percent of the migrants who travel without official approval have Grade 10 certificate and 24.6 percent of them school dropouts after Grade 7
• 21 percent of them have dropped out of school after Grade 5

Fortunately, the Nepal Government has introduced Prime Minister Employment Program, which is slowly changing the job scenario in the country. Let’s hope that the employment situation in Nepal changes for the better with this initiative.

Also Read:

• Self Employment Ideas in Nepal