Youth Employment in the Digital Economy

Preparing youth for the digital economy and the future of work by giving them the skills needed and the confidence to compete in both local and international job markets. 

Our solution mainly focuses on preparing youth for the digital economy by giving them the training and the skills needed to compete in international job markets. Creation of a digital skills training platform with the right resources and knowledge will be our primary step. We will try to identify the right talent by having a selective process. Through this process we will select people with interest and passion in technology and digital skills and have desire to learn. After the programmes students will have their portfolio and profile ready and will be given the opportunity to work and see their knowledge and skills in action by providing them a working space with high internet speed and laptops to connect with international job markets. 

Somaliland and Somalia have one of the highest unemployment rates in the world (Over 70% unemployment). Also, the last figures from the Somaliland labour force report stipulated that less than 20% of females are employed. This rapidly rising unemployment in Somaliland, especially among school-leavers and university graduates, has fueled an increase in irregular migration, drug addiction and conflict, according to a study conducted by the Somaliland National Youth Organization (SONYO).

As the job market in Somaliland/Somalia fails to provide job opportunities to youth it is important to bridge the gap between the local and international job markets. Last but not least, our proposed solution is solely trying to solve this problem and in general we want to create hope, make a change and tackle poverty in the long run.

Our solution will focus on school-leavers and university graduates. According to Somaliland’s National Development Programme, unemployment among these youth stands at 75%, which is much higher than the nation’s average of 61.5% in urban areas and more than 5,000 students are graduating from Somaliland universities every year. To enter into a particular career field each one of these graduates requires relevant knowledge and professionally structured digital skills that provide real-life experience.

This program will increase chances of employment for fresh graduates and for youth in general, so that they can create a better future for themselves and their families. In addition to this, the program will also reduce the negative impact of irregular migration and drug addiction. It will also contribute towards increasing overall digital economy in the country.

So far I have not done a detailed research by myself and finding a reliable data and statistics is very hard especially in this part of the world. As a fresh graduate and a citizen of this country (Somaliland) I faced some of these problems first hand. After my graduation I was unemployed and after a few months one of my friends introduced me to freelancing platforms and that is when I realized the potential and jobs offered in these platforms which most of the Somaliland youth are not aware of. Adopting and understanding this was easy for me because my computer science background helped me a lot. Moreover, my friend and I conducted two workshops to help some students and fresh graduates and introduced them how freelancing works and how we can overcome youth unemployment through freelancing opportunities.

My solution is at the idea stage. Two of my friends and I are working about its feasibility and how we can make it a reality. From a former experience I understand the challenges and obstacles ahead but I believe it is worth trying. Until this day I have conducted two workshops for university students and fresh graduates. 

We are not introducing a new technology in our solution but rather using the existing technologies. Computers with internet connection are the core technology we need in our solution. These computers will be used for learning and conducting training. In addition, this computers will support graphic designing and modeling software as this may place significant requirements on graphics, memory, etc.

From our experience in the workshops we have conducted we saw there is a great need for our solution so we expect to serve around hundreds of students in the first six months in our center and in the next six months we are planning to scale up and launch an online platform which can serve all youth around the country especially in the regions outside the capital. 

To create an innovation and learning centers for the youth to study and practice digital skills needed for the international online job markets.

To construct free online platform for people with disabilities, woman and the financially disadvantaged youth outside the capital to get the knowledge and skills required for digital freelancing.

To create awareness campaigns among the youth and the community on how to overcome unemployment challenges through digital freelancing. 

To involve other stakeholders working in the tech sector such as Telecommunication Companies, INGOs and government on how to reduce the high youth unemployment rate in Somaliland through digital economy.

Our plan for measuring our impact goals

1. Number of youth trained through our training center and online platforms.

2. Number of youth employed after training and graduation.

3. Number of partners engaged in the digital campaign.

Some of the barriers we are facing are:

1. Financial barriers to create the physical training center and online platform. 

2. The technical skills and infrastructure to train the youth to get employed in international job markets.

We are a group of three people with different knowledge backgrounds. I am a computer science graduate and my other two friends graduated from Electrical and Electronic Engineering and Accounting and Finance. I believe that our diversified knowledge background and eagerness to learn will give us a good position in delivering this solution.

After identifying this solution I started looking for local organizations with interest in such solution. Luckily I found a local organization with interest in technology driven education and they welcomed my idea. Right now, we are working with them and looking for ways which we can make this solution a reality.