Editorial by Andrew Russell, UN Development Coordinator and UNDP Resident Representative

15 July marks the World Youth Skills Day, a day when the world recognizes the value of helping young people to develop the skills necessary to contribute to better futures for all. While more and more young people have better opportunities for education and skills development than ever before, some 75 million adolescents globally are out of school, are deprived of a quality education, and unable to acquire the skills they need for a prosperous life.

With the youngest population in Europe, these challenges are commonplace to Kosovo. With an overall unemployment rate of 35% and youth unemployment rate at a staggering 61%, young Kosovars do not have things easy. In other words, roughly 2 out of 3 young Kosovars in the labour force do not have a job. What’s worse, the current economic growth is only able to produce jobs for about 29% of the 11,500 persons entering the labour market each year. No wonder that unemployment keeps being one of the toughest challenges that people in Kosovo face.

While the problem may be seen as a lack of job opportunities, this hides a deeper problem: a mismatch between skills that Kosovo needs and the skills on offer. On the one hand, the education sector (including vocational institutions) is not preparing young entrants to the labour force for the kinds of jobs that are being increasingly demanded by employers in the private and public sectors. On the other hand, employers struggle to find well-qualified applicants for their vacancies. This skills mismatch prevents both individuals and employers from reaching their full potential.

Ban Ki-moon, the UN’s Secretary General summed it up nicely when he said: “With the right skills, these young people are exactly the force we need to drive progress across the global agenda and build more inclusive and vibrant societies. Skills development reduces poverty and better equips young people to find decent jobs. It triggers a process of empowerment and self-esteem that benefits everyone. And it strengthens youth capacity to help address the many challenges facing society, moving us closer to ending poverty hunger, injustice and environmental degradation.”

We know from years of experience that a job provides more than just income. It translates into opportunities for better access to healthcare and education, improved nutrition, more resilient housing, and more. In the case of Kosovo, increasing employment can help to reduce the temptation to migrate, either by legal or illegal means. Kosovo needs all of its young people and decent work is the key to convincing them to stay and build a more prosperous future here, not abroad.

At UNDP, every day we witness the enormous potential of young people in Kosovo. We work with partners from the public and private sector, as well as with the international community, to scale up investments in the skills and ingenuity of young people. Our projects work with young people to develop skills, find job opportunities, and ease the transition from education to employment. We also cooperate with Kosovo institutions to close the skills mismatch and to provide modern, effective, and well-tailored employment counselling services to jobseekers.

Since 2005, UNDP and its partners have helped more than 12,000 Kosovans find employment and obtain new marketable skills through active labour market programmes such as on-the-job training and temporary wage subsidies. Last year, together with the Ministry of Labour and Social Welfare and the Government of Finland, we pioneered a new Self-Employment Programme that assists young people to launch their own start-ups in sectors as diverse as wood processing, pastry making, clothes design, mobile apps development for the visually impaired, or metalsmithing. This year, we expanded the programme resulting in a total of 82 new businesses. We also promote agricultural activities among youth by providing new skills and grants to upgrade farms, since we know that agriculture can be a solid means of income for Kosovars who are willing to work the land.

I want to end by stressing that Kosovo is not alone in its fight for decent jobs. Indeed, many young Kosovars participated directly in the definition of the world’s new development agenda: The Sustainable Development Goals. Sustainable Development Goal #8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth) could not be more relevant to the almost one-third of Kosovo’s 15-to-24 year olds who are not in education, employment, or training. On this year’s World Youth Skills Day, we call upon each and every young Kosovar woman and man to not give up, to continue to seek out every opportunity to improve skills and to take on a more proactive role in building a prosperous and stable economic future for all Kosovars, starting with themselves.