Analysis of existing system of acquiring employability skills and development of new model to enhance the employability of urban youth

Abstract

India is going under major changes in recent years due to its phenomenon economic growth. Currently the population of India has crossed the mark of 1.15 billion and by 2026 it will cross 1.4 billion. Each year there is increase of 2% in the Indian labour force which is around 7 million per year. High economic growth created large number of jobs in the market, but still the response from the industry is lukewarm in terms of the productivity of the labour force. There is major concern about the unemployabilty of the Indian youth. According to many reports the productivity of Indian labour force is far below as compared to world standards. If India has to maintain its growth and become sustainable economic power, it has to create skilled labour force. Skilled labour force is the byproduct of the sound educational and training system. Everywhere in world, India is seen a future economic power because of its strong demographic dividend but low employability of the people is becoming the major concern despite rising demographic dividend. Though India’s population is moving away from the less productive agriculture sector still 90% of the labour force is working under informal sector on very low productivity levels. Taking into account the changing realities of today’s world it is necessary that Indian educational system must be flexible which can deal with present day phenomenon of globalization and competitiveness. Converting our people into productive people requires radical reform of our labour market ecosystem that includes labour demand, labour supply, and labour laws. This project report aims at critical analysis of the present educational system, methods of acquiring employability skills and the essential skills required by labour force. The objectives of our study are given below: • Analysis of present India’s educational and training system through which urban youth acquire employability skills. • Study and analyze the relation between acquiring employability skills and jobrelated pathways (employment system) that urban youth can access. • Development of suitable models for better employability of urban youth and generation of compatible processes to improve the existing system for acquiring employability skills. Explore opportunities for public-private partnerships for ‘repairing’ and ‘preparing’ poor urban youth for better job opportunities. The methodology consisted of secondary research by reviewing the related literature, discussion with concerned stakeholders of the entire system i.e. primary research in the form of direct interview of poor urban youth and direct interview of government officials involved in providing training and employment opportunities to urban youth. The secondary research was done to get an idea about the existing situation. The reports on skill development by World Bank and Indian Labour report (2008 and 2009) by TeamLease provided good insights of the present situation. In the primary research, more than 15 urban youth were interviewed who either are pursuing their vocational education from the ITIs or going to join in future. Discussions with potential candidate of vocational education pointed about the lack of future employment and the lack of infrastructure in the institutes. Discussions with Government officials involved in providing employment opportunity pointed towards the lack of necessary employability skills in the urban youth. Key findings of the study are as follows: Literature review pointed towards the complex education and training system in India, large aspirants of vocational training as compared to existing infrastructure, poor linkage between vocational training institutes and industry. • Educational System Framework of India and compared with developed countries (Germany and Japan), it can be seen that the system in India is rather complex. • Poor quality of employment and lack of support from government after completion of vocational education • Low teacher’s strength and very less industry interaction coupled with lack of basic infrastructure are also the source of poor skills. Based on the field research and analysis of the secondary and primary data, the following solutions have been suggested to increase the effectiveness of the educational and training system in India: Providing the counseling support to the vocational education participants after the courses and side by side enhancing the industry-institute interaction. Developing the PPP model and using the concept of CSR route(by corporate). Proper delegation of roles to various departments are also necessary. For long run sustainability a major restructuring is required in the education and training system as well as greater emphasis on providing skill training for the unorganized sector.