Informations et ressources scientifiques
sur le développement des zones arides et semi-arides

Innovations for Poverty Action

Titre : The Impact of Tech-Training and Job Referrals for Youth in Kenya

Région /Pays : Kenya

Date : 2016-2020

Résumé
Access to quality jobs is a pressing concern in sub-Saharan Africa. In Kenya, researchers partnered with the technology company Sama and Innovations for Poverty Action to conduct a randomized evaluation of Sama’s training and job referral programs. The training program provided youth from underserved communities with digital training, while the referral program provided trainees with a job referral to work with the company. Providing both training and a job referral increased earnings by 37 percent and reduced unemployment rates by 10 percentage points.

Présentation
Access to quality jobs is a pressing concern in Sub-Saharan Africa. More than one third of employed workers in the region still lived on less than $1.90 a day as of 2018, and 60 percent of all salaried jobs were in the informal sector in 2016.1 2 Opportunities for well-paying formal-sector jobs are in high demand as population growth has exceeded formal sector job growth in the region. Barriers to quality employment are particularly large for youth, who often lack the skills and information to access good jobs. Compared to employed adult workers, employed youth in the region faced a poverty rate (living on less than $1.90 a day) twice as large in 2018. 3] For young women with childcare responsibilities or young people who are spatially disconnected from job opportunities, these barriers can be even larger.

An increasing number of low-and-middle income countries see the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector as having the potential to generate a large expansion in well-paying formal-sector jobs and rapid economic growth. Opportunities in this sector might be well-suited for young jobseekers in Sub-Saharan Africa given the significant number of young computer-literate individuals fluent in several global languages. However, there is little evidence on both how to equip these young workers with the skills required for digital work opportunities and on how this type of work might impact their livelihoods.

Taille de l’échantillon  : 1,115 low-income youth

Innovation for Poverty Action (IPA)