Archive for October, 2009

Youth & Employment: SLN 3 in Uganda

Posted on October 14, 2009. Filed under: Part 2: Case studies and Resources, Part 3: Our process |

One of the key challenges of the future for Uganda’s youth is youth unemployment. Reversing this trend is a major challenge for any developing country, more so for Uganda which has an upright population pyramid with a high dependency ratio. According to the state of Uganda population report 2006, over the past two decades, youth have continued to form a broad base of the population. In 2003 World Bank statistics where showing that Uganda’s overall unemployment rate stood at 3.2 percent, whilst that of youth (15-24) stood at a whopping 22.3 percent.

During this third session of the Sharing and Learning Network (SLN) we have been able to discuss this topic at length with youth activists from CSOs and Donor agencies who have a diverse knowledge and experience in working with youth, particularly in creating entrepreneurship opportunities.

After this session I wish to note that I have personally come to understand that investing in young people is not only a social obligation, but makes economic sense. Young people’s involvement in planning and in all processes of policy formulation is therefore paramount.

Unlike other sessions, we did not only structure questions around the theme for the group to follow, but allowed the participants to generate their own questions for the working groups. This was intended to enable the audience to discuss the key issues for them in relation to engaging youth in improving employment policies and practices.

The questions generated were:. 1) “How should the young people be involved in policy formulation and implementation”; 2) “What are the gaps and issues in Uganda’s draft employment policy’; and 3) To identify initiatives that engage youth in improving their employment opportunities (for both mini discussion groups).

We where also informed by one of the participants that in 2005 Uganda became a lead country of the ILO/UN/World Bank Youth Employment Network, which has contributed towards the development of the National Action Plan for Youth Employment. A comprehensive draft National Employment Policy is currently before the cabinet waiting to be adopted. With ILO support Uganda is pursuing an integrated policy on youth employment which addresses three key priority areas: poverty reduction, elimination of child labour and mitigating the socio-economic impact of HIV/AIDS at the work place.

Please click here to see the report on Draft SLN 3 Report Ug 14-10-09.

Sammy Kavuma, Youth Participation Officer

SLN III: Youth Conducting Research in Nepal

Posted on October 13, 2009. Filed under: Part 2: Case studies and Resources, Part 3: Our process |

The world has realized the potential inherent in youth. Meaningful youth participation in development has been recognized as something indispensable. Any development project rests upon the foundation of a strong research, and is incomplete without monitoring and evaluation. The third Sharing and Learning Session (SLN III) on “In what ways has an including young people as participants and protagonists in research, monitoring or evaluation added value to our work?” hosted at GTZ Health Sector Support Programme and aimed at:

• Identifying work that relates to research and M&E involving young people.
• Identifying how youth have been involved in the process and its effect on the research and M&E?
• The challenges/successes faced whilst working with youth in research, monitoring and evaluation?
• The lesson learnt while involving youth in research and M&E?

The session started with a presentation on how youth were involved in the research titled “Assessment of Status of Youth in Nepal” jointly carried out by Ministry of Youth and Sports, Nepal Planning Commission, Save the Children and AYON. Following the presentation, the participants were divided into two groups. Group I comprised of the younger participants while the other group of adults. The most interesting part of this workshop was to see the perspectives on youth that each group presented. It is anticipated that the mapping exercise on “who is doing what” will create effective collaboration among agencies and decrease duplicity. The participants’ feedback on the SLN also reflected that the network building for future collaboration was one reason for attending the SLNs.

The findings based on experience that participants shared whilst working with youth in research, monitoring and evaluation included:

• While implementing youth related projects it is essential to involve young people as young people have better understanding of youth issues and youth open-up to youth more easily.
• Youth always look forward to working in a team, but it is also necessary that the job responsibility be clearly divided.
• Once hired young people might have expectations to be rehired as a staff. Therefore organizational policies should be made clear.
• Youth are highly mobile, and contracts for only a few working days which span a long period of time risk facing a turn over of young consultants.

Definitely, there is a long way to go in terms of involving youth as protagonists in research, monitoring and evaluation. But, with the learning that each of us have gathered, all future works will be made smoother. Like it is said “Learn from the mistakes of other, we do not live long enough to make them all ourselves”. I am sure the SLNs are serving as a forum to help us move more smoothly in achieving our organizational goals.

Please click here, to see the Draft SLN_III_Report 13-10-09.

Samrat Katwal, Youth Participation Officer