Employment Fund to train 16‚000 youths

The Employment Fund in association with Helvetas Swiss Inter-cooperation Nepal is planning to train 16,000 Nepalis in 2014.

The training is expected to fulfill the growing demand for skilled youth labour force in country to some extent, said the Fund, adding that every year around 450,000 youths enter the labour market but are incapable of addressing the market needs because around 90 per cent of them are unskilled. "The Fund will train and employ 12,000 marginalised youth, who are in dire need and develop 4,000 youth as entrepreneurs, who can create employment later."

The Fund – after a survey on market demand for skill – determined the required skills to be provided to labour. It has selected 39 organisations across the country to provide training for the current year. They are also responsible for the job placement of trainees. The Fund also spends around Rs 50,000 per person in providing training, it added.

In the first phase of the programme, youths are provided with skills of their interest. "They will work as a paid employee during the training period and later establish their own business and generate employment for at least one another," according to the Fund that aims at generating 4,000 employers this year under the programme.

Likewise, the second phase focuses on marginalised youths – who are in extreme condition – including youths living with HIV, gender violence survivors, handicapped, street children and orphans, prisoners and former prisoners, bonded labourers and squatters. It plans to benefit 12,000 youth.

The Fund – since its operation in 2008 – has been benefiting around 70,000 youths of the country, out of which around 50,000 are in training related jobs, it claimed but the unemployment is rising.

It has provided 121 types of training till date, it said, reporting that on an average they are earning around Rs 5,500 per month. "Labours who have been employed for the past three years are earning Rs 10,000 on average."

Most of those who have quit their jobs despite the training are women due to pregnancy, low wage and family pressure, added the Fund that has categorised people earning less than Rs 4,600 per month even after the training as underemployed.

"People who earn around Rs 10,000 per month are not interested in foreign employment," according to team leader at the Employment Fund/Helvetas Swiss Inter-cooperation Nepal Bal Ram Paudel.

Last year around 35 per cent – of the 17,000 trainees – were self-employed, he claimed.