Building an equitable future needs stronger ‘Skills Ecosystem Building’ for youth in Bangladesh

Young people in Bangladesh find themselves at the forefront of navigating through immense challenges socially and economically in the current context. As the country finds political stability in the coming future under the interim Government, it is time to take stock of what youth really need from society. One-fourth of the country’s population is between the ages of 15-29. Based on the NEET population the country is 28.8% of the young population, which is roughly 13 million. According to the Labour Force Survey 2016-17, 92% of work is in the informal sector, which is about 12 million young people. BRAC, as an organisation, has always stayed relevant to the needs of youth inclusive of the informal sector. As Bangladesh has gone through massive changes since independence, BRAC’s message remains steadfast with Youth Reboot. 

After the student movement, we have spoken to hundreds of young people, and we do see a positive shift in them. Even the youth, who have been critically injured, losing a limb or losing their eyesight, showed interest in engaging with different skills-enhancing initiatives to support their families. After speaking with 10 youths who visited the BRAC Limb and Brace Centre for artificial limb support, this scenario was revealed. The average age of these youths ranged from 18 to 22. Except for two, the others were involved in different income-generating activities like driving, working as a helper in an embroidery factory, working as a painter, working as a salesperson at a sweet shop, and working as a barber. Their average monthly income ranged from BDT 8000 to 10000. When asked about their future plans, they showed interest in getting training in driving and IT-based training as they believed it would be difficult for them to return to their previous professions due to their injury-related disability. 

Like them, the majority of youth are enthusiastic about changing their lives for the better, moreover, they feel like they have a duty towards the country now. They want access to quality services and employment opportunities that will help them grow as global citizens.

Importance of working towards a strong skills ecosystem:

The majority of skills programmes, not just locally, but also globally focus on supply-side interventions. While skilling programmes are popular worldwide, there is plenty of evidence that they don’t work in the long term, especially for girls, highlights Nicola Banks (2024) in her article that I have co-authored. Along with supply-side interventions, understanding the power relations of the labour market and how this influences inclusivity and sustainability of employment has to be taken into account while designing such projects. The first step, and the most important one is sensitisation of families, local communities, and markets on how important skills building is for our youth, the second, is increasing access to skills and jobs-related information through social media marketing channels and the third is a post-training support where ensuring safety and security at workplaces are important steps to consider. In our long-term skills programme known as BRAC’s STAR programme, we are trying to tackle some of these issues. We have trained over 120,000 youth with 60% girls being enrolled in various skills. Soft skills and linking to local jobs are part of the training process. A 4-year randomised control trial research done on STAR graduates shows that youth who participated in STAR, post-training increased aggregate employment by 31%, and earned on an average 23% higher on average (Banks et al, 2024). The gender dimensions are very important to note, when we see in the long run, women take up self-employment and men tend to work towards better employment with higher wages. Another vicious cycle is the girls who are subject to child marriage. Recently I had the opportunity to visit a remote location in Dacope, in Khulna, where climate vulnerability has caused 9 out of 10 girls to get married as early as 14. The majority of these girls are now separated from their husbands or divorced, as their husbands have remarried. These women are in the most difficult situations where they need to learn a skill quickly and have to earn a living to feed their children. Often parents cannot afford to feed so many mouths. We see this in other locations as well, where social barriers remain high for women’s economic and social empowerment.

This is when only skills interventions cannot meet the demand and we need to think beyond skills. Even though we, as BRAC invest heavily in changing patriarchal norms, it is hard to see long-term results in labour market inclusivity as an outcome. Cultural, social, and religious norms create barriers to sustaining employment for women. As per our latest research, only 42% of girls can withstand non-traditional occupations such as mechanics or IT-based employment. Boys do not face this challenge, even though with boys, issues are more around dropping out of training due to ‘other employment opportunities’ that are more precarious, but do not require training. Boys that remain in training and take up employment want to upskill themselves, where access to upgraded skills is limited in skills development institutes in general. 

How do we build a skills ecosystem?

The narrow approach taken is skills projects to only look at skilling youth, which will not result in sustained employment. We will have to design skills projects keeping activities of sensitising the parents, and community and go beyond NEET youth. Starting from secondary education, boys and girls should be trained in digital skills and exposed to diverse career opportunities, rather than waiting until university to start considering job prospects. They have to learn how to search for jobs, and not only be fixated in government jobs. A nationwide skills development campaign may address these challenges, working with parents and the community will be helpful. BRAC is working with ILO in Cox’s Bazar under the ISEC project for example for a behavioural change campaign. Skills technical training will have to have inclusion and safeguarding training, starting with teachers, market actors and students. All training has to be inclusive of mental health training support going forward. Strong social accountability will have to be there within the community, where locally educated youth can play a strong role. In parallel, dropout youth, especially girls will need post-training support, funding for starting self-employment or micro business opportunities and markets will have to be sensitised to reduce hostility towards women and girls joining the labour markets. Recognition of prior learning (RPL) will have to be strengthened and accessible for young people. The industries will have to be further informed about the benefits of hiring graduates through the RPL system.

Creating an enabling environment is not enough, we have to maintain it. Continuous investment must be made to ensure youth have a supporting environment where they can thrive. For girls, we want their husbands and in-laws to be supportive of working women and share care responsibilities. We desire inclusive markets where women will not find it difficult to go to work every day bearing reputational risk. For boys, we want society to be kinder, and more accepting of all occupations, and not push them to do risky jobs, both at home and abroad. We want an equitable and just community where collaboration at local levels will be supported by the national level. BRAC in this space has been working as an anchor to strive for more inclusive policies, and we will continue to do so in the coming years. 

References:
1.https://mole.portal.gov.bd/sites/default/files/files/mole.portal.gov.bd/page/ac7088c7_a211_4905_9ff3_1e62af00c837/LFS_2016-17_compressed.pdf
2. https://www.brac.net/latest-news/item/1430
3.https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09614524.2023.2229077#abstract
4. https://youtu.be/_m7BWqxdiEo?si=rjXfbFnJRved13oo
5.  https://youtu.be/_m7BWqxdiEo?si=rjXfbFnJRved13oo