Technical/Vocational

Overcoming the twin challenges of child labour and the youth decent work deficit will be critical to Ghana?s progress towards realising its broader social development goals. The current Report examines the related issues of child labour and youth employment in the context of Ghana.

Despite substantial improvements in access to basic education and steady economic growth, The Gambia still faces considerable challenges in respect to reducing poverty. As the result of its narrow economic base and its reduced internal market, the country will continue to rely heavily on the productivity of its citizens to reverse the cycle that keeps families in poverty generation after generation.

The overarching goal of this study is to facilitate Cameroon?s strategic objective of ensuring that the country has a well-educated human resources base to support its quest to emerge as a strong middle-income economy by 2035. This study is intended to support Cameroon in preparing a national strategy for skills development, related policies and institutions to boost competitiveness and productivity, and job creation.

The overarching goal of this study is to facilitate Cameroon?s strategic objective of ensuring a well-educated human resources base in support of its quest to emerge as a strong middle-income economy by 2035.

Burundi is at a critical stage in its development. The key messages included in this brief are as follows. After 13 years of conflict, Burundi has made progress in consolidating peace and security, and is now looking towards stimulating economic growth. Out of a total labor force of about 4.3 million, 3.8 million (88 percent) are employed in agriculture, 132,000 (3 percent) in trade and 112,000 (3 percent) in the public sector.

With limited land, capital, and a fast growing population, Burundi's main asset is its youthful population. Its main challenge is also to create good quality jobs for its youth. With low levels of educational attainment and poor health status, the quality of this young population is poor. After more than 13 years of conflict ending in 2000, and a period of modest recovery, Burundi has the opportunity to stimulate growth. Burundi is making strides in creating one of the fundamentals of job creation - investment climate.

Human development is one of the pillars of Botswana?s Country Partnership Strategy with the World Bank (2009-13). The Country Partnership Strategy (CPS) is in line with Botswana?s ?vision 2016,? which, in terms of human development, envisions the transformation of Botswana to ?an educated and informed nation? and to ?a prosperous, productive and innovative nation? as two key cornerstones of the strategy.

Botswana has pursued prudent macroeconomic policies to manage the revenue streams from diamond exports. It is now an upper-middle-income country that outperforms other countries in Sub-Saharan Africa on key indicators of socioeconomic performance including education, health, and social services. The economic structure in Botswana has undergone changes in recent years, but these changes have not yet ended the country's reliance on diamond exports. Until recently, Botswana also had a telecommunications monopoly; other utilities are not always accessible at competitive terms.

Botswana has an official unemployment rate of 17.8 percent. The low labor-intensity of growth is a potential explaining factor for this high level of unemployment. It is thus essential to analyze the role of education and training in the access to employment. This note finds that the role of education has changed under the effect of schooling expansion and persistent unemployment. Labor market institutions appear to have a limited impact on employment and wage levels, while the importance of active labor market programs is growing.

Employment issues are the most serious problems facing South Africa currently. Among these are the problems of unemployment, as well as underemployment or lack of decent work for the already employed, compounded by labour markets that are generally less than efficient in job search and matching. Unemployment in South Africa, by narrow standards, is approximately 25 percent, an extraordinarily high level, made even more worrying by its stagnancy or growth at different times over the past decade.