Prospects for youth in the Least Developed Countries

Ambassador Ertuğrul Apakan, Permanent Representative of Turkey to the United Nations, considers the prospects for youth in the Least Developed Countries in the context of the implementation of the Istanbul Programme of Action.

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Youth are the future of tomorrow. Today’s generation of young people is the largest in history. Over three billion people – nearly half of the world’s population – are under the age of 25. Any undertaking and/or initiative with regard to development should comprise certain elements which take into account not only the importance, but also the potential of the youth.

In view of the necessity dictated by the current circumstances, relevant bodies in the international community have acquired a stronger youth profile over the course of the last decades. The more innovative, coordinated and mutually supportive, the greater progress in helping build and harness young people as assets could be achieved by various projects. This prospect is more significant and valid in view of the ongoing efforts vis-a-vis the Least Developed Countries (LDCs).

The 48 LDCs face persistent challenges such as wide-spread poverty, deep structural inadequacies, high debt levels, low human development. The gravity of these challenges grows as the capacity to confront them diminishes. Fifty three per cent of their populations live below the poverty line. By the year 2050, the population of the LDCs is expected to double, and every day, more than 30,000 young people enter the labour force. LDCs often suffer from poor governance and political instability that in some cases lead to conflicts. LDCs’ economies are largely agrarian, dependent on very few commodities, and affected by a vicious cycle of low productivity and investment.

The group of LDCs grew at an average of 5.6 per cent between 2000 and 2010, due to stable macroeconomic policies, increased remittances and Foreign Direct Investment, among other factors. The income of some LDCs in a short span of time. However, despite such achievements, the LDCs have not experienced great social improvements and/or employment advances. Due to their relatively high population growth, LDC performance in per capita terms has also been relatively modest.

The lack of institutional co-ordination and the heterogeneity of the actors responsible for promoting youth employment are among the major obstacles in LDCs. Often the responsibility for youth employment policy is split among a wide range of public institutions, operating in isolation and with little co-ordination. The lack of a coherent strategic approach results in the fragmentation of efforts and the waste of resources.

In addition to structural impediments, the global economic and financial downturn, which came immediately after the food and energy crises, resulted in lower growth rates, increased unemployment and aggravated the coping mechanisms of the LDCs. A new paradigm of growth, which is needed globally, should aim for stable economies and opportunities for decent jobs.

All this indicates that there is not just a continuing but an augmented need for collective and cooperative action at the international level. In this context, the relationship between UNIDO and the LDCs, which was identified as ‘Partners for Prosperity’, deserves recognition and support.

The Fourth United Nations Conference on the LDCs, held on 9-13 May 2011 in Istanbul served as a robust complement in this regard. The conference gave a strategic focus to the complex issues the LDCs are facing. The high-level attendance to the Conference demonstrated the importance attached to the LDCs by the international community. The world leaders reaffirmed their commitments to extend full support to the LDCs, with a view to enabling half of the LDCs to meet the criteria for graduation from this category by the year 2020.

The Conference resulted in the adoption of a bold Political Declaration and a comprehensive Istanbul Programme of Action (IPoA), which calls for a shift in development paradigm balancing the role of the state and the market. The IPoA sets the ambitious goal for LDCs to bolster productive capacity in all sectors through their structural transformation and effective integration into the global economy, while creating decent employment, especially for youth. This is the only sustainable way to reduce poverty and inequality. The document also seeks to address wider concerns on education, health, social protection and the empowerment of women. Thus, the core elements of the IPoA mean more than the long-standing official development assistance (ODA) commitments and trade opportunities, which are also vital for the development of the LDCs.

The Conference also provided the young people with the opportunity to scrutinize the existing challenges and to outline their vision and perspective for the future. “The Istanbul Declaration of the Youth Forum” clearly manifested their determination and willingness to act rather than react.

Development and security are extremely broad and elusive concepts, but they are inextricably linked. The fact that nine out of the ten countries with the lowest human development index have undergone conflict over the last 20 years clearly sets for the nexus between security and development, which also affects development assistance policies. The Security Council of the United Nations currently has over 70 conflicts in its agenda, and two thirds of these conflicts are related to Africa and the LDCs. In that respect, the UN Peace Building Commission focuses its attention on the reconstruction and institution-building efforts necessary for recovery from conflict and on supporting the development of integrated strategies in order to lay the foundations for sustainable development.

The High Level Plenary Meeting on the Millennium Development Goals in September 2010 in New York showed that many LDCs suffer from conflict and armed violence. According to a World Bank assessment, 19 LDCs, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa, are fragile and conflict-affected states whose populations are suffering from weak institutional capacity, poor governance and political instability. Turning round in a post-conflict country to prevent relapse into violence and inequitable development is also an important challenge for the LDCs. In those countries, in particualar, measures adapted to country specific situations have to be taken in order to address their human, economic and social implications. Actions to restore security, generate trust, create employment, and provide services in local communities lay the foundations for national progress.

Conflict-affected LDCs have predominantly young populations without a decent job; many of them having been deprived of education, having grown up in violent societies and often having been combatants themselves. In addition, most youth with jobs get very low pay and don’t have any job security. This often leads to social exclusion. In those countries, helping young people to realize their full potential by gaining access to employment should form a key component of any stabilization and peace-building process and is, as well, a precondition for poverty eradication and sustainable development. Young populations can contribute to such processes substantially as youth is the agent of change and development.

The IPoA stipulates strengthening support for the LDCs affected by conflict, to address country-specific needs and situations, including broad-based, inclusive and rapid socio-economic development with a special focus on rebuilding national institutions and capacity, rebuilding critical infrastructure and generating productive employment and decent work for all.

At Rio+20, the international community agreed in general terms the post-2015 global development framework through an ambitious set of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which will be coherent and complimentary to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). In this context, a common agenda is needed to achieve our development goals and targets, with a particular focus on LDCs.

The IPoA, together with the Outcome Document of the Rio+20 Sustainable Development Conference, provide a framework to address the challenge of employment, in particular for youth and women. The thematic areas and cross-sectoral issues outlined in the Rio+20 Outcome Document complement the IPoA, and will facilitate enhancing productive capacity, which in turn creates jobs and eradicate poverty.

Furthermore, the main focus of the High-Level Thematic Debate on the State of the World Economy in 2012, which was held at the United Nations General Assembly last May, and the Annual Ministerial Review of ECOSOC was employment and decent work, in particular for young populations.

In accordance with the IPoA and the Rio+20 outcome, and taking into consideration the policies and good practices at regional and national levels which were presented in the above-mentioned meetings, the following strategies may be pursued:

• Commitments of the international community on youth employment need to be operationalized at national level.
• The LDCs should undertake a prudent and a strategic mix of macroeconomic, trade and investment measures to combat unemployment.
• Education plans need to be integrated into the wider employment, poverty reduction and development frameworks. More emphasis is needed on quality education that is relevant to the job market, modern skills and equal prospects to compete for jobs and business opportunities.
• Further mobilization of resources for scientific research and technology development programmes to increase agricultural production and productivity should be promoted to provide decent jobs for youth in the sector.
• Support for the green economy in LDCs should focus on labour intensive sectors, such as renewable energy, energy efficiency and agriculture, as well as small-scale community-led tourism operations that preserve natural ecosystems and generate employment for unskilled rural youth.
• Large scale public works projects, infrastructure and housing programmes need to be given priority to create more jobs.
• Most of the post-conflict regions need reconstruction and rebuilding, especially in war torn communities. Youth from these local communities should provide the central workforce for such reconstruction projects in order to generate major employment opportunities for youth with limited skills.
• The entrepreneurial potential of young people – particularly young women – should be harnessed in order to create new growth opportunities in small and medium sized enterprises. Thus, they need to be provided with access to finance, markets and insurance against risks.
• The active participation of the private sector, including through delivery of public goods and services can contribute to economic growth and job creation, including through the important tool of public-private partnerships. Thus an enabling environment for the private sector including market access, prudent regulation and transparency needs to be created. Private capital flows can then supplement the public resources and ODA to accelerate growth and development.

The International Financial Institutions could consider playing a greater role in alleviating the negative developmental effects of conflict through social cohesion and employment creation programs. But, the IFIs are not equipped to lead specialized international support in these areas. A clear lead within the UN system would help this effort.

The post-2015 development agenda, including the continuation of the Millennium Development Goals coherent with Sustainable Development Goals to be agreed, should also address the factors related to youth unemployment in LDCs.

In Turkey, the youth unemployment rate demonstrates a relatively declining trend in recent years, as the Government has been implementing various programmes to provide decent jobs and income for young populations. Considering the fact that the most important obstacles for young people to enter into labour market are the lack of skills and a mismatch between supply and demand, Turkey assigned more than two thousand “Job and Career Counsellors” for guiding and advising young people on job-seeking and facilitate job matching. Extensive vocational and on-the-job training courses in various sectors with high employment potential have been organized to improve the skills of young. Entrepreneurship training, grants and loans have also been provided to those who intend to establish their own businesses.

In this context, Turkey stands ready to assist LDCs in addressing the challenge of youth unemployment through sharing experiences, organizing training courses and providing advice in line with their national programmes.

Finally, the full and effective implementation of the IPoA is the major undertaking of the international community. A business-as-usual approach to policymaking is not sufficient to place the LDCs on the path to more dynamic and inclusive development. The international community should make all possible efforts to contribute to the effective implementation of the IPoA in harmony with the results of the Rio+20 Conference. It is a challenge, but equally it offers a multitude of new opportunities. After all, ensuring high and sustainable growth for the LDCs is the key for a more prosperous and stable world. To achieve this, we all need to put our minds to it.

● Ertuğrul Apakan was appointed Ambassador of Turkey to the United Nations on August 27, 2009. Prior to that, he served as the Under-Secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Turkey from December 2006 until August 2009.