Youth Empowerment in Kenya and Zimbabwe

ILO Project Youth Employment Support, Jobs for the Unemployed and Marginalized young People YES JUMP, funded by the Federal Republic of Germany and with the overall technical management from ILO’s Regional Office for Africa in Addis Ababa, Youth Employment Support (YES) Jobs for the Unemployed and Marginalized young People (JUMP) Project has been established in Kenya and Zimbabwe.

The YES-JUMP Project  is part of the ILO’s response to the Decent Work Country Programme adopted by the Government, Workers and Employers (ILO’s tripartite constituents) in both Zimbabwe and Kenya. The objective of the Project is to contribute to the poverty alleviation efforts through creating decent and sustainable jobs for the youth of poor and marginalized communities. Its aim is to help partner communities and youth groups find more socially responsible and community driven solutions to poverty alleviation, with at least 50% of its target group being young women.

The Project is also a part of ILO’s response to the Global Jobs Crisis in supporting young men and women in jobs creation and enterprise development. The principles of Decent work, Sustainable livelihoods and community participation guides the project in its strategy.

YES-JUMP is assisting local communities in selected districts of rural and urban areas, in collaboration with the government, employers’ and workers’ organisations, to create one thousand decent jobs in each of the countries.For example in East Africa – Kenya – Selected areas are Athi River, Nyandarua South and Nakuru districts while in Southern Africa – Zimbabwe – Selected areas are Gokwe, Goromonzi and Norton districts

In partnership with another ILO project, COOP Africa, YES-JUMP has also developed a Youth Fund which works through a competitive call for proposals and provides increased access to financial services for young people along with business development services.  Youth is defined by the African Youth Charter as women and men between the ages of 15 and 35 years.The project strategy is, thus, to create a broader partnership between local stakeholders to implement priority projects for youth at the community level.

The two immediate objectives of the project are:

(i) The creation of one thousand sustainable and decent jobs for young women and men in selected communities in each project country, taking participatory approaches, in order to reduce poverty

(ii) Institutional building assuring that selected project partners at national and local levels are fully able to design and implement their own youth employment schemes.

The direct project beneficiaries are the young women (50%) and men in rural and urban economies in Kenya and Zimbabwe, as identified by the project partners and the project’s National Steering Committees, composed of the government and representatives of social partners (employers’organisations and trade unions)and youth organisations, including cooperatives and local organisations at the community level.

In Kenya, a pool of local trainers was created on the module Start and Improve Your Business (SIYB). These trainers have continued to mobilize and reach the youth. So far, over 519 youth have received both business start-up and business management training as well as savings mobilisation and group dynamics training while in In Zimbabwe, similar trainings have been conducted for youth as well as the provision of loans amounting to approximately USD 42,000.As a result, youth have started businesses and created jobs for nearly eight hundred young people in Zimbabwe. 

This project has hence been positive to the youth of both Kenya and Zimbabwe since there has been Inculcation of a culture of savings amongst youth through the formation of Savings and Credit Cooperatives,there has been Promotion of the entrepreneurship culture,there has been Achievement of technical and vocational skill training and there has been Creation of around eight hundred jobs mostly in following sectors of Horticulture, Manufacturing, Retails and Service industries.

Reference : www.africa-eu-partnership.org