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| Sunday, 5 October 2003 |
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C'wealth Asia helps combat unemployment By CHAMIKARA WEERASINGHE The government has requested the Representatives of Commonwealth Youth Programme's Asia Centre to promote micro business development and youth entrepreneurship programmes to combat rising unemployment in the country. Unemployment in Sri Lanka is expected to reach double digits by the end of this year as against the 9.7 per cent, recorded last year. The following is an interview with the Commonwealth Youth Programme's Asia Centre Regional Director Ms. Raka Rashid, on the Commonwealth Asia's approach to unemployment in Sri Lanka. Q: How would you describe the presence of the Commonwealth Youth Programme's Asian representation in Sri Lanka? A: As youth unemployment is a major issues in Sri Lanka, the government has requested our assistance. We will explore ways and means of tackling the unemployment problem. Q: What is your experience on the issue of unemployment in Sri Lanka? A: We have organised a number of workshops on career counselling and youth entrepreneurship. One of the questions that has come up constantly is "what do we do in the area of youth unemployment, especially as there are not enough jobs. As you are aware, Sri Lanka has this particular problem of educated youth who are unemployed. Q: How do you propose to tackle this issue? A: The Commonwealth Secretariat has adopted a model called the Commonwealth Youth Credit Initiative (CYCI) which we plan to introduce in Sri Lanka. It is a medium and micro-finance programme which gives small loans to low-income groups so that they can start their own businesses. Q: Have you tried this system in other countries? A: Yes, The Youth Credit Initiative was first started by us in India in the Punjab about five years ago. It was then taken to Chandigar and other parts of the Commonwealth, Caribbean and South Pacific. YCI proved to be very successful in those countries. For the past few weeks we have been discussing how we could bring this model to Sri Lanka as the Sri Lankan Government has asked us to start the model in the Southern Province. Q: Why Southern Province? A: It is because the South has received funding for a major ADB project and there is some money for small and micro-business projects. If the project is successful we will take it to the North-East and islandwide. We are planning to spend US $ 17,000 on the programme at the start. Q: Is the project similar to what you introduced in India in terms of loan allocations? A: It won't be exactly what it was in India because of differences in the regional context. There will be slight changes, but the basic model will be kept intact. We will train suitable people from government institutions and NGOs in Sri Lanka on the management of the project. The sizes of loans may be adjusted to suit the needs of the community. Q: How does the Commonwealth Youth Credit Initiative function? A: We allow the people to choose what they want to do, because from experience this method is more effective and pragmatic. Once a group of women came to us in Chandigar, who already knew how to sew. They wanted to buy industrial machines. They told us with more machines they can get bigger orders from companies and schools. So we arranged a loan for them. They bought four or five machines and they got big orders for uniforms from a few schools and companies. So the skill is often there, what they need is capital to start things up. It's the part of our market study, that's being done here on the skills of the people, what is available and what is not, and what can sell. |
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