Study calls for strategies to address youth unemployment

AMMAN — A study titled “Future prospects for youth from an economic perspective” suggests the promotion of initiatives and programmes that support young people all over the Kingdom, the Jordan News Agency Petra, reported on Friday.

The study prepared by the Association of Banks in Jordan (ABJ) Director General Adli Qandah recommends the implementation of plans, strategies and programmes developed by governments in cooperation between the public and private sectors and relevant stakeholders.

Qandah said that the study aimed to identify the challenges and economic opportunities facing the youth.

He added that young people in Jordan face several economic challenges, including unemployment, shrinking labour market indicators, decline in economic growth and the impact of the Syrian crisis on economy.

Qandah said the major challenge for Jordan is to stimulate growth that will result in job creation as the economy is suffering from a recession. The growth rate in 2016 dropped to around 2 per cent compared to 2.4 per cent in 2015.

Qandah predicted that Jordan’s economic growth rate will slightly recover to 2.3 per cent in 2017, with a minor improvement in the near future to reach 2.6 per cent between 2017 and 2019.

The results of the study stressed that the future prospects for Jordan’s youth are determined by two main factors: The existence of plans, policies and programmes that enable the Jordanian labour market to absorb in the increasing number of young jobseekers and having initiatives and business incubators targeting the Jordanian youth. 

These programmes seek to enhance young people’s skills and provide them with the necessary expertise to enter the labour market.

The study also showed that the percentage of young people in Jordan aged 15-34 years constituted around 36.3 per cent of the population in 2016, of which 46 per cent are female, which requires equal employment opportunities for both genders.

The study also pointed out the rise in unemployment rates in 2016 to 15.3 per cent and the first-half of 2017 to 18.1 per cent, where young people aged 15 and 39 constitute more than 90 per cent of the unemployed in Jordan.