Livelihood Enhancement-Displaced Workers

Orion Educational Society, is an 80G and FCRA certified organization. It is the largest Training Partner of NSDC. It was established in the year 2007 with the sole aim of empowering the unemployed youth with the knowledge & skills required by the Industries and to solve India’s problem posed by the huge gap in demand and supply of skilled labor, the target being skilling 400 million youth by 2022. 

Orion provides skill and livelihood training to people from different social groups. Our training has yielded impact through improvement in income and standard of living, not only for the individuals but their families and communities as well. 

We have skilled more than 450,000 and provided employment & self-employment opportunities to 360,000+ aspiring youth, mainly from rural/ semi urban areas of India. We focus on unemployed graduates and school dropouts. We also provide vocational training in schools & colleges as embedded programs.  

The COVID19 pandemic has severely hit every section of society in terms of both health and financials. But most badly hit, in India, are the 40 million migrant workers who have been forced to return back home, without any certainty of being able to join back the workforce in the near future. This reverse migration has opened up doors for promoting small and micro businesses in sectors like Agriculture, Beauty & Wellness, Apparel, Food Processing, FMCG, and Logistics. Keeping this in mind, Orion is providing reskilling and upskilling training programs to this segment of populations by helping them get placed in local jobs. In addition, through creating market linkages like Self-Help Groups, access to government schemes like National Rural Livelihood Mission and Mudra loans, we are promoting entrepreneurial initiatives. It directly affects SDG1- No Poverty and SDG8- Decent Work & Economic Growth. 

In India, close to 1.5 million workers enter the job market every year. Apart from the challenge of there being fewer jobs than workers, most of these jobs are concentrated only in some of the more commercialized and industrialized states of Maharashtra, Delhi, Haryana, Punjab, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Telengana, Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh. This creates the monstrous problem of labor migration leading to more unemployment. Although, the unemployment rate is on the decline, from 23.5% in April-May 2020 to 17.5% in June 2020, that by no means has helped reduce poverty riding on this current wave of reverse migration. But it can easily be said that this problem has not risen overnight. It is the outcome of an ever-increasing gap in the demand and supply of skilled workforce in the country. The Skill India Mission's target of skilling 400 million youth by 2022, shows a very grim picture and looks like an almost impossible task now given the current economic downfall. Thus, the need to upskill has never been more important before. 

Orion aims to-

• Reskill/Upskill migrant worker basis identified foundation skill
• Identify wage employment opportunities for placement of beneficiaries
• Promote entrepreneurship through skill training program
• Identify market linkages for end beneficiaries Provide mentoring and hand holding post training

These will be done through 

• Research-based skill mapping of beneficiaries
• Identification & Mobilization of Beneficiaries
• Setting up of Infrastructure (Physical centres and e-learning platform)
• Community Rapport Building through Rozgar Melas, Awareness Camps
• Training Delivery on Skills and Entrepreneurship Development (includes physical practical classes, online theory classes, industry exposure, industry expert-led lecture sessions and mentoring sessions)
• Partnership Building for Market Linkages (NRLM, SHG’s, Mudra Loans, NBFC’s etc.)
• Partnership Building with local industries for wage employment
• Assessment & Certification of beneficiaries
• Placement Drives (for wage employment) Post-training handholding and monitoring through field visits and monthly calls

The program aims to benefit the migrant worker population in India, who are currently faced with an uncertain future and are being driven to extreme measures including self-inflicted deaths. 

The program aims to impact their lives in the following ways-

• Beneficiaries will gain from reskilling/upskilling training
• At least 60% beneficiaries will be placed in wage employment post training
• At least 30% beneficiaries will be supported for self-employment Increase in beneficiary household income by at least 30>#/li###
• Create jobs in the long run through setting up new businesses
• Empower wage employees to become ambassadors for reskilling and upskilling Encourage saving and investment to improve financial security

Orion Educational Society has been serving the needs of building a skilled workforce in India for the last 13 years. In the wake of the COVID19 pandemic, our key intervention area threw up two critical challenges-

1. How do we re-absorb the displaced workers in aspiring jobs in industries?

2. How do we enhance livelihood opportunities without having to displace the workers for a second time?

The answer was simple. The key to creating decent work and economic growth, we realized, is to create match aspirations and opportunities available in the market. And this was the genesis of the idea for working closely with displaced migrant workers and elevate them to the next level of livelihood generation- that is through entrepreneurship.

The idea struck us about 2 months ago and we have been striving relentlessly to raise funds to support this initiative, but with very little luck.

Skill development and vocational training is key to becoming a developed country. And this is not just in terms of GDP growth, but also standards of living of the skilled workers, that is, the population majority in India. Orion dreams of an India where every worker is skilled enough to get into an aspirational job or career on day.

1. Scale of operations- Orion has a presence in 29 states of India. We have worked with partners- both CSR initiatives and the government (central and state), to provide impetus to the Skill India Mission. 

2. Multi-stakeholder partnerships with governments, corporate, and other CSO's. We rely heavily on strategic partnerships to be able to deliver the most effective program on ground and benefit the last mile worker with the highest quality of training. This is only made possible through generous donor partners and incredible design partners who also share values and our passion for developing vocation for a better performing nation.

3. Market Credibility- Largest Training Partner of National Skill Development Corporation

In the current pandemic situation, raising funds have been tough, if not impossible. Our primary sources of revenue- CSR funds and government projects, both have dried up. And the situation is not likely to change drastically in the next few months. But to keep the ship afloat and prevent it from sinking, we have resorted to other avenues, while ensuring that we do our bit to contribute significantly to fighting this deadly virus. 

A few interventions that have brought innovative solutions-

1. In-house mask manufacturing- This has been our proudest intervention because they have been spearheaded by students and beneficiaries who have been trained by Orion in the past. They have now acquired the necessary vocation to manufacture these masks and also act as our fundraisers through various distribution channels.

2. Relief Work- Orion was one of the first NGO's in India to respond to the need of providing relief to those usually left behind. We are still providing dry ration and hygiene kits, with support from some our existing partners.

3. Awareness & Training- Orion is supporting local municipalities to provide training to community health workers and create awareness in different neighborhoods.

In the face of the pandemic, many vocational training institutes have been forced to shut down, either temporarily or permanently. Orion believes that its staff is its strength. Orion has been able to retain most of its staff, by adopting various strategies, including volunteering and pay cuts, in the hope that the turnaround will happen soon. 

Orion's programs are designed in a way that caters to the following needs-

1. Identification of most aspirational districts for project implementation ensuring alignment with priority areas for most backward sections 2. Need assessment to ensure effective program delivery 3. Tailor-made courses as per need assessment findings 4. Multi-stakeholder engagement involving local community and government representatives to ensure a magnified effect in terms of enrolment and long-term engagement. 

5. Combination of tech-based and in-person training modules to enhance learning

Current number of beneficiaries served- 450,000+

Beneficiaries to be served in one years- 650,000+

Beneficiaries to be served in next 5 years- 1,500,000+

Orion aims to create diverse employment opportunities by imparting skill training to close to 2 million youth by 2025. 

The major challenge in achieving the goals is unavailability of enough funds (both private and government aided) to encompass every beneficiary who needs skill training

Some of our most successful programs have been-

 5 ITI under PPP Model in West Bengal  Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)- Provided Skill development Training with more than 30 Corporates like  & provided sustainable livelihood training to more than 45,000 youth.  Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Grameen  Kaushalaya  Yojana (DDU- GKY – Implementing projects of more than 400 Crores across 17 states in India under   Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY)-  Established 50 Model centers in more than 10 states to train the youth this scheme.   Rashtriya Madhaymik Shiksha Abhigyan (RMSA) Implementation of Vocational Training in more than 800 schools in 21 States providing Vocational Training to students from Class VIII – X.  Other Government Project: Provided training in various other Projects like UPSDM, BSDM, GULM. NULM, Seekho& Kamao, Nai Manzil, MANAS   Vidhyarthi Scheme- Provided Skill Loans from Nationalized Banks under IBA Guidelines and also from NBFC’s to more than 3,200 youth  Train & Hire -Provided Corporate Training like Train and Hire, Hire and Train, Up-skilling and re-skilling.

Grant-based funding of USD 3,000,000 over 3 years

1,00,000 USD to cover salaries, operational costs and overheads.