Prince helps tackle unemployment
If royal visits are generally noted more for their pomp and ceremony than for substance then the official visit by the Prince of Wales to Guyana is a wonderful exception. The heir to the British whose passion for such non-royal issues as poverty and the environment has won him support from many quarters has made unemployment among the central focus of his visit to a country which has hosted a number of members of his family. Business Page last week referred to the number of terminations which are taking place in some of our most successful companies adding to the thousands who are finishing schools and University and coming on to the job market. There are no statistics on unemployment but all the evidence suggests that youths are among the hardest hit groups as employers continue to ask for 'x years experience in a similar capacity.' Each year successive budget speeches continue to identify youth employment as a national problem. President Jagdeo announced in 1998 the launch of a Youth Employment Programme which was intended to develop a training and placement programme in association with potential employers. In 1999, he again referred to training programmes for unemployed youths, self-trained artisans and technicians. Despite these commitments the problem appears to have worsened due in no small measure to the absence of adequate training infrastructure, the performance of the economy and the fact that the private sector was not brought on board either through persuasion or enticed by fiscal and other inducements. Both the private and public sectors find that expenditure on training is largely dissipated through migration and poaching by other employers making them reluctant to invest significant sums no matter how great the need. President Jagdeo must therefore be relieved at the initiative of the Prince and assumption by IPED of responsibility of a key role in the Guyana Youth Business Trust (GYBT). He must be acutely aware of the risks to democracy posed by unemployment and poverty and while the GYBT is certainly not a panacea it offers hope and opportunities to those who wish "to establish themselves in the business field and attain betterment." Despite all the rhetoric about youths being the future of the country we continue to under-utilise the resources they offer to contribute to nation building often forcing them to migrate in the search for opportunities. The thrust of the GYBT as expressed in its mission statement is practical and simple: "To help young people, who would not otherwise have the opportunity to develop their self-confidence, achieve economic independence, fulfil their ambitions and contribute to their community through the medium of self-employment and job creation." The scheme is "based on the belief that young people are themselves the best resources for promoting their development and that they must be both architects and agents in meeting the challenges and solving the problems faced in today's world." Its introduction to Guyana is the result of a carefully conceived and executed plan by Mr Edward Glover, British High Commissioner to Guyana who has been working quite successfully, given all the odds, to re-establish the ties between Guyana and the former colonial power. The GYBT will be managed by a Board of Trustees with responsibility for the effective and meaningful use of the Trust's resources. Working from the network of IPED branches it will have its own headquarters at IPED, but functioning as an independent body. It will draw on the expertise and experience of IPED which has an impressive record in the micro-enterprise sector to identify youth opportunities and select entrepreneurs for assistance. Key concept A key element of the whole idea is the concept of the "mentor" where selected youths will have access to a mentor whose responsibilities will include acting as a coach and friend of the new business; provide continuous support for the first 2-3 years of starting the business and acting as mediator for ideas providing feedback and advice, not instructions. This wonderfully simple concept is perhaps the best feature of the scheme since it covers the period when a new business is most prone to failure. The private sector, the Government and the European Union have all agreed to contribute to the Trust which will treat the funds on a revolving basis. The role of the mentor is likely to strengthen the business and therefore facilitate repayment of the loan which along with interest will be available to other borrowers. A number of leading businesspersons have already agreed to serve as mentors although it appears that many of those identified so far are from Georgetown. With unemployment being a country-wide problem the Trust will need to have mentors from the rural and hinterland communities as well particularly since the rural areas are targeted by the Trust. National problem What makes this even more urgent is the fact that the Trust has seen it fit to identify unemployment in the rural areas as "particularly acute". It would be a mistake for the Trust to assume that the situation in the inner sections of Georgetown, in Linden and in New Amsterdam is any less serious. At this stage unemployment is a national issue requiring national approaches and solutions. Urban communities combine other disadvantages including little or no recreational facilities, no opportunity for rearing poultry or animals or engaging in domestic gardening. As a limited form of compensation the urban areas are still the centres of business activities and government offering more employment opportunities. The commitment by both the private and public sectors is critical to the success of the scheme. President Jagdeo has welcomed the initiative which fits neatly into his Government's policy objective but towards which the public sector appeared to have achieved very little results. He can and should provide not only direct finance but fiscal incentives as well. For starters donations should be tax deductible and the Trust be made into a tax exempt organisation. Supporting our youths to become entrepreneurs is not only good economics but make for politics as well. In addition to being mentors the private sector needs to support the new entrepreneurs by buying their products and services. This of course applies to the Government as well which still remains one of the country's major consumers. Conclusion This scheme has to be seen as one of the many initiatives required to tackle the problem of unemployment generally. The macro-economic framework buoyed by repeated and substantial debt write off has not been enough recently to galvanise the economy into the type of growth which we require. Indeed growth last year has been accompanied by significant job losses, a situation which is clearly troubling. Our education system must equip our school leavers at all levels to move reasonably easily into the job market. We have to invest more in technical and vocational education relevant to the needs of the country. As far as possible we must pay equal attention to teachers salaries and technology as we pay to school buildings. Businesses should be encouraged by various incentives to invest in training and technology. We need to promote those sectors which offer rapid employment opportunities as part of a concerted effort to stem the tide of unemployment. It is reaching crisis proportion. Even as we recognise the need for attention to the problem at the wider level we should commend the three persons who are principally responsible for the Trust: Mr Yesu Persaud for his courage in taking up the challenge, the British High Commissioner who threw out the challenge at the last AGM of the Institute of Private Enterprise Development and the Prince of Wales for a clear demonstration of his commitment and passion for a simple idea that offers real benefits. We now look forward to the setting up of the mechanisms to allow the disbursement of the funds so far made available.
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