There is hell lot of people on the tarmac, university, college, currently looking for a job. If you are one of them, you may need to rethink of your strategy. The economy is not creating enough jobs annually. There are high chances you may be looking for a job for the next five years and more. It is now ten times more difficult to find a job in Kenya than it was 10 years ago.
I have seen a lot of policy makers and politicians talk
on doing something about the employment situation as a top policy priority. In fact
the Jubilee Government came into office with the promise to create more
opportunities for the youth and the country at large. But there is very little
that has practically been done about the situation. There’s a pervasive sense across
government that nothing more can or should be done, that we should just wait
for the economy to grow to trickle down to workers.
The truth of the matter is, when the economy is on
the growth trajectory, very few jobs are created. The economy has to stabilize
for the opportunities to begin to trickle down to the citizens.
With the projections for economic growth by Government,
it will take years before unemployment declines to normal levels. And all
indications and activities around the various national scale infrastructure
projects show that those projects will need to be completed for actual jobs to
trickle down to the citizens.
According to the Kenya Beureau of Statistics, Unemployment Rate in Kenya increased to 40% in 2011 from 12.70% in 2006. In Kenya, the unemployment rate measures the number of people actively looking for a job as a percentage of the labour force.
80% of the unemployed Kenyans are below 35 years old. the challenge of youth unemployment is compounded by the fact that 90% of all employed people lack vocational skills. Approximately 800,000 young Kenyans enter the labour market
every year. The current youth unemployment rate stands at 35%.
GDP Annual Growth Rate
in Kenya is expected to be 5.70% according to Trading Economics global macro models
and analysts’ expectations. The estimates show the GDP Annual Growth Rate in
Kenya to stand at 6.41 in 12 months’ time. The inflationary effects and the
continued infrastructure development as well as low tax returns, things don’t look
as rosy as projected.
The damage
from sustained high unemployment will last much longer. The longer our
graduates remain unemployed, they tend to lose their skills, and even when the
economy finally stabilises in growth, there will still be difficulties in finding
a job, because they’re regarded as poor risks by potential employers.
On the other
hand, students who graduate into a poor labor market start their careers at a
huge disadvantage and pay a price in lower earnings for their whole working
lives. Failure to act on unemployment isn’t just cruel, it’s short-sighted.
Then there
is the group of Kenyans who after graduating and searching for jobs with little
success, take up any offer irrespective of their area of specialization. These type of people end up frustration
leading to poor productivity at the job place.
Can the Kenyan Government consider creating an
emergency jobs program?
I remember in the 2009 Obama stimulus bill focused
on restoring economic growth. It was, in effect, based on the belief that if
you build G.D.P., the jobs will come. But if that could be the same route, the
current infrastructure development needs to be humongous enough such that at
the completion, it could absorb millions of the unemployed.
During the campaigns the Jubilee Administration
promised to create tax incentives to companies that take up young people to
offer job training, internships and mentorship opportunities. This policy has
never been implemented. It also promised to collapse the existing Funds targeting
the youth and the Kenya Industrial Estates into one agency. The proposals seems
to have hit a snag.
We urgently need a somewhat cheaper program that generates
more jobs for the unemployed population. Such a program should at best lead
directly to job creation. An intensive programme that helps or incubates
innovators to start ideas that when implemented will generate more jobs for
millions at scale.
With the Counties now at the centre of development,
a lot more could be done that is not being done. We need to see the counties
announcing measures to create more opportunities for their people at local
level thus achieving economic growth at local level.
Every time Government thinks of creating jobs for
the youth, they always run towards low paying, hard labour kinds of National
Youth Service initiatives and the long gone Kazi Kwa Vijana Initiative that
ended up enriching the old guards. It’s time a programme that would offer
relatively low-paying (but much better than nothing) public-service employment.
Direct public employment can create a lot of jobs
at relatively low cost. The Economic Policy Institute, a progressive think tank
in the United States, argued that spending $40 billion a year for three years
on public-service employment would create a million jobs.
If businesses were offered structured direct
incentives for employment, there would be more jobs being created. Employers should
be encouraged to add workers as the economy expands. Companies should be
encouraged to design sustainable growth plans that takes more employees over
time thus expanding into new horizons. A tax credit for employers who increase
their payrolls is a worthy policy that will lead to the creation of jobs.
The expense that may come with providing tax
subsidies to companies and organizations, far more outweighs the value of
having more citizens productively engaged. There is currently a much higher
cost of inaction in the face of a social and economic crisis the country may
plunge herself in.
While the Government needs to get serious on
creating an enabling environment for private institutions to create more jobs,
the young people also need to begin to use their school acquired knowledge to
innovate and resolve our current social problems. Of course that requires
investments and revenue in research and innovative ideas. It is that creativity
that has lacked in our country. Majority of university graduates today are more
of job seekers. Is it because our education is more of a theory and not a
practice oriented. Something has to be done about that too.
We can no longer maintain status quo, it will come
at a high price. Things not need remain as they are. I believe we can create
more jobs — and yes, we MUST.
