(Reuters/Rafael Marchante) High rates of joblessness are a persistent concern for Moroccans.
Morocco’s Economic and Social Council (CES) is working on a solution to the youth unemployment crisis.
According to a recently released report from the council, youth unemployment remains high, particularly in urban areas. Young graduates are badly affected, with those with vocational training degrees registering among the highest levels of unemployment.
“It’s absolutely essential to achieve a significant change in the growth model, to rethink the education and training system and to choose a more locally-based management style which takes more account of the outcomes,” said CES chairman Chakib Benmoussa, who presented the study to the press on Friday (July 22nd).
The report provides an assessment of the current approach and puts forward some alternatives on the basis of 44 meetings involving community groups, government officials, trades unionists, professionals and experts.
The report shows that youth unemployment is a long-term issue, noting that it can take some more than a year to find a job. On top of this, jobs held by young people are characterised by fragility and precariousness, often with unpaid or underpaid work, as well as a low level of medical coverage.
The whole structure underpinning employment policy, and particularly government programmes, does not meet the needs of job seekers such as Moukawalati, according to Moncef Kettani, president of the General Union of Businesses and Professions.
Kettani, who is also the committee’s rapporteur on the issue, said that young people have complained to him about the lack of transparency in the way large companies are managed and the scarcity of financial support for those seeking self-employment.
There needs to be a thorough assessment to allow authorities to sketch out the basics of what will become a pro-active national programme over the coming weeks, aimed at young people who have been most severely affected by unemployment, said Driss Guerraoui, the CES Secretary-General and an advisor to the prime minister.
Six main areas have been identified by the CES study: injecting new life into the labour market, promoting self-employment and business creation, improving the employability of young people, establishing tools suited to priority unemployed groups, improving governance of the labour market and the development of extended intermediation services.
The council is calling for the creation of an employment and training observatory whose task will be to set up an ongoing “network” to compile all the available information in this area, look at it, analyse it, share it and make everything needed for decision-making available to key players.
The council’s report confirmed worrying findings about youth unemployment in Morocco, according to sociologist Samira Kassimi. She told Magharebia that it is time to work hand in hand to find effective solutions, not only to calm things down for a while, but also to find lasting outcomes to counter the scourge of unemployment, given that programmes have been implemented, but so far they have proved to be of little use.
