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Youth Participation&Employment in the MENA region

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Launched in 2017, the Youth Participation and Employment (YPE) programme is a five-year initiative, implemented by Oxfam IBIS (Denmark), and funded by the Danish Arab Partnership program. YPE aims to improve economic opportunities for young women and men in Egypt, Jordan, Morocco and Tunisia. By building diverse and effective partnerships, it seeks to achieve three outcomes: (i) strengthened technical and life skills that enable young people to actively engage in society; (ii) increased organisational capacity of institutions, the private sector, entrepreneurs and communities to support young people; (iii) enhanced advocacy and dialogue between youth, public and private institutions, and business.

Entity

OXFAM IBIS Youth organization, civil society, non-governmental, non-profit organization

Technical assistance, expertise and implementation; Policy, advocacy and convening power; Financial and/or in-kind contribution

Partners

  • King Hussein Foundation

    Foundation or philanthropic organization

    Technical assistance, expertise and implementation

  • Leaders of Tomorrow

    Youth organization, civil society, non-governmental, non-profit organization

    Technical assistance, expertise and implementation

  • Jordan Hashemite Fund for Human Development

    Youth organization, civil society, non-governmental, non-profit organization

    Technical assistance, expertise and implementation

Sustainable Development Goals & targets

  • 8.3 Promote development-oriented policies that support productive activities, decent job creation, entrepreneurship, creativity and innovation, and encourage the formalization and growth of micro-, small- and medium-sized enterprises, including through access to financial services
  • 8.6 By 2020, substantially reduce the proportion of youth not in employment, education or training

Themes

Achievement At Glance

8737 young men and women employed in job for pay and/or job for profit of which 47 percent of employed are women; 5146 of youth employed are in NEET situation; 39 percent of the supported youth in entrepreneurship skills development succeeded to be self-employed and have employed one to five employees in their businesses as indirect benificiaries of YPE programme, 20 local partner organisations increased their organisational and management capacities through skills development. 

Key Highlight On Guiding Principle

  • Focus on the creation of decent jobs and the improvement of the quality of work
  • Focus on achieving impact at the country level and pursuing regional perspectives, where appropriate
  • Promotion of gender equality

Gender equality and NEET were meanstreemed in the programme intervention; Synergies between local partners in the four country of intervention were support through common trainings and regional learning events; 

description

The program will support partners in capacity-building and developing strategies. Stakeholders will be supported to promote inclusive youth participation through networking with private companies, facilitating contact between employers and job seekers, promoting decent work through internship and matchmaking and identifying employers. Partners will be supported in influencing policies and practices related to youth employment through awareness-raising campaign, research on entrepreneurship and innovation, fostering decent job opportunities for young people and enhancing women’s safety at work.

Influencing work ought to tackle the three priorities to induce sustainable and long-lasting impact for young people in the labour market: (i) tackling the tax infrastructure to make it more conducive and supportive for young entrepreneurs aiming to grow and secure dignified work for employees they hire; (ii) actively engaging with the issue of unpaid care work and influencing governments and private sector actors to assume responsibility in recognizing, redistribution, and reducing unpaid care work for women; (iii) tackling inequalities in the labour market, especially for women and youth on the basis of decent and dignified work.

Country teams will implement the program in partnership with local organizations. A project management unit governs the overall operation and adds value through its regional component.

https://www.dapp.dk/en/
https://www.facebook.com/OxfamMENA
https://o4my.org/the-land-of-love-ype-films-women-unpaid-care-work-in-egypt/

Deliverables and links to SDG targets

  • 10,000 young people trained in relevant skills, including technical and vocational skills, ICT skills and soft skills

    8.3 Promote development-oriented policies that support productive activities, decent job creation, entrepreneurship, creativity and innovation, and encourage the formalization and growth of micro-, small- and medium-sized enterprises, including through access to financial services

    Youth supported through (i) vocational training and development of professional skills; (ii)  training of trainers to become employment counsellors and deliver soft and technical skills; (iii) employment training programs for specialized employment topics and life skills; (iv) soft and job-oriented skills training, online self-development and employment skills courses.

    BY: Jun 2022
  • 100 youth-led enterprises created or improved

    8.3 Promote development-oriented policies that support productive activities, decent job creation, entrepreneurship, creativity and innovation, and encourage the formalization and growth of micro-, small- and medium-sized enterprises, including through access to financial services

    Youth startups and innovation supported through (i) entrepreneurial coaching sessions and networking opportunities; (ii) SMEs and individual projects to start or improve their businesses; (iii) workshops with entrepreneurs and start-up acceleration; and (iv) enterprise management skills training, mentoring and market access events; (V) Seed funding for startups through acceleration programs.

    BY: Jun 2022
  • 5,000 young people supported through entrepreneurship training, advisory services, access to markets or access to finance

    8.3 Promote development-oriented policies that support productive activities, decent job creation, entrepreneurship, creativity and innovation, and encourage the formalization and growth of micro-, small- and medium-sized enterprises, including through access to financial services

    Youth trained in communication, civic and empowerment skills to support youth-led initiatives. Decent work-related capacity-building for partners promoted, credit facilities set up, feasibility study and marketing campaigns conducted. Social enterprises supported through a grant scheme and technical advisory services. Innovative funds established to support youth's access to finance.

    BY: Jun 2022
Egypt
Jordan
Morocco
Tunisia

Start

01-Jul-2017

End

30-Jun-2022

USD 18,500,000

Estimated total value of the commitment

9,600

young people to benefit directly from this commitment

Target: Only young people 25-29, 30-35

Primarily:
  • Young people in urban areas
  • Young people in rural areas
  • Young women
  • Young men
  • Youth with disabilities
  • Low-income individuals
  • Young people with low levels of education and/or drop-outs
  • Graduates of second-level education and students in third-level education or beyond

Challenges faced in implementation

COVID-19 pandemic has created irregularities in the programme implementation plan where several off-line activities where canceled but some of them were converted to online; Because of the COVID-19, it was not possible to conduct monitoring visits to partners. Most of the programme activities were conducted online but the level of the programme quality was reduced. 

Gallery

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