ILO’s approach to youth employment Trade Union policies for decent work generation for young workers ILO’s approach to youth employment Turin, 25 February 2015

This presentation ILO’s approach to youth employment; Guiding principles; Policy, strategy or national action plan? This presentation

ILO’s approach to youth employment Economic policies Sustainable enterprise development, entrepreneurship Skills and employability LM institutions and policies Workers’ rights Governance Policy areas for decent work Global Employment Agenda Decent Work Agenda Declaration on Social Justice Resolutions on youth employment ILO policies Knowledge building Technical assistance Partnership Means of action Mainstreaming youth employment in national development/employment policies Development of youth employment policies, national programmes and action plans Design, monitoring and evaluation of targeted youth employment programmes Youth employment areas of intervention The ILO’s strategic approach to empowering Member States to secure decent work for young people unfolds at policy and programmatic level. At a policy level, the Youth Employment Programme assists Member States in developing coherent and coordinated policy and programme interventions, integrating youth employment priorities in national development strategies, and formulating evidence-based youth employment policies, national programmes and action plans. At programmatic level, it assists constituents to design, monitor and evaluate targeted youth employment interventions. The figure shows the linkages among the principles of the core ILO policies (the Decent Work Agenda, Global Employment Agenda, the Declaration on Social Justice for a Fair Globalization). These detail the options that may be considered under different policy areas to attain decent work, the areas of intervention of the Youth Employment Programme, and the means of action to deliver assistance to constituents to promote decent work for youth. DECENT WORK FOR YOUTH

Guiding principles: International labour standards ILS on employment provide guidance on the main principles of employment policy, the attainment of full employment, actions to address the barriers faced by young people in the labour market and access to skills development opportunities and employment services: C122, Employment Policy Convention, 1964; C142 Human Resources Development Convention, 1975; C88 Employment Service Convention, 1948; C181 Private Employment Agencies Convention, 1997; R189 Job Creation in SMEs Recommendation, 1998; R193 Promotion of Cooperatives Recommendation, 2002.

Guiding principles: Social dialogue Social dialogue provides a forum where competing interests can be negotiated and resolved in the overall national interest; It gathers support for proposed policies and reduces the chance of future opposition and conflict that might reduce their effectiveness later on; This principle requires that mechanisms be put in place to allow for the concerns and interests of employers’ and workers’ representatives to be voiced.

Guiding principles: Youth participation and gender mainstreaming Young people have the right to express their views on policies affecting their interests, and to have those views taken into account during the formulation and implementation of those policies (ILO C122 Employment policy). Gender mainstreaming makes the concerns and experiences of women and men an integral part of the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of youth employment policies, so that young women and young men benefit equally.

Guiding principles: Policy coherence Policy coherence is the systematic promotion of mutually reinforcing policy action across government structures. It ensures that macroeconomic policies support efforts to create productive employment and strengthen social protection coverage. In the design of YE policies, policy coherence requires that planned policy interventions be screened through the “decent work for youth” lens, i.e. when there are alternative intervention possible, the policy options with the greatest coherence with the goal of decent work and full, productive employment should be chosen.

Guiding principles: Balanced policy mix It refers to the combination of economic, employment and social policy options which is most effective in achieving the goal of decent work for young people. It means deploying an approach that combines macroeconomic and microeconomic interventions (i.e. on the economy as a whole and on the behaviour of individuals and companies) and addresses labour demand (the amount of labour an economy is willing to employ) and labour supply (the amount of labour that workers are ready to provide) and quantity and quality of employment.

Guiding principles: Monitoring and evaluation Monitoring and evaluation serve to: Ensure that there is a justification for a policy and that resources are efficiently deployed; Demonstrate how far a policy has achieved its objectives and how well it has used its resources; Improve the performance of policies and the effectiveness of how they are delivered; and Increase understanding of what works in what circumstances and how different interventions can be made more effective.

Policy, strategy or national action plan? The choice of the most appropriate policy format to promote youth employment depends on: Extent of the youth employment challenge and scope of existing policies; Available or pledged resources; National capacity to implement complex interventions; National policy formulation and adoption procedures;

Policy, strategy or national action plan? Mainstreaming youth employment in national development, poverty reduction or national employment strategies (specific youth employment policy objectives and targets); Formulation of a youth employment policy/strategy (resources; adequate implementation mechanisms; monitoring) Development of a national action plan on youth employment (time-bound; clear implementation mechanisms; and certain resource allocation).

Some lessons about NAPs development (1) Is youth employment a priority? Some lessons about NAPs development (1)

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