Indian Economy and issues relating to Planning, Mobilization of Resources, Growth, Development and Employment; Inclusive Growth and issues arising from it.
In NEWS : A ground plan for sustainable mass employment; Creating employment in the long run
A high rate of unemployment among educated youth in the country remains a major cause of concern. What major policy initiatives are required to create mass employment that is both sustainable and dignified?
The PLFS 2017-18 noted that “the unemployment rate among the youth was much higher compared to that in the overall population.”
Current Status:
- According to India Employment Report 2024, the percentage of educated youth among all unemployed people in India is increased to 65.7% in 2022.
- Periodic Labour Force Survey 2019-20 had found that a wage earner is in the top 10% if he/she earns ₹25,000 a month.
- Short-duration skill programmes have had low long-term placements. This is often on account of wage being low for a life of dignity in urban areas.
Therefore, it is important to determine the floor rate of wages and ensure high-quality public goods.
Policy initiatives are required to create mass employment:
- A decentralised community action, to identify skilling needs should be implemented.The gram sabha or basti samitis in urban areas can play a critical role in taking government programmes to the people.
- Converging initiatives for education, health, skills, nutrition, livelihoods, and employment at the local government level to ensure community accountability. Providing untied funds, functions, and functionaries for effective quality outcomes.
- Introducing need-based vocational courses/certificate programmes alongside undergraduate programmes in every college can be made compulsory in every college.
- Standardising nursing and allied health-care professional courses in all States according to international benchmarks. Nurses, geriatric care-givers, and health paramedics are required on scale in and outside India.
- Creating community cadres of care-givers to run crèches universally so that women can work without fear.The Community Resource Persons of the Rural Livelihood Mission is a good model to follow. Community cadres can have multiple livelihoods in agriculture, animal rearing, non-farm opportunities, and retail shops
- Investing in Industrial Training Institutes (ITI), polytechnics as hubs in skill development for feeder schools. Schools can develop an equivalence framework for academic and vocational inputs in terms of credits and hours.
- Enterprise and start-up skills through professionals in high schools can be introduced.
- Instead of standalone government-funded skilling, co-sharing model of apprenticeships with industry on scale can be best wayforward as it improves employability and reduce skills gap
- Streamlining working capital loans for women-led enterprises/first-generation enterprises to enable them to go to scale. The success of the Start Up Village Enterprise Programme (SVEP) under the NRLM brings out the importance of hand holding, Community Enterprise Fund, and end-to-end solutions for first generation entrepreneurs.
- a universal skill accreditation programme for skill providing institutions should be created, and letting the state and industry jointly sponsor candidates for courses.
By implementing these policies, India can create a sustainable and dignified employment environment for its educated youth, contributing to overall economic growth and development.
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