SHILLONG, MAR 22: The state government today said the state is suffering from structural unemployment even as a three-pronged strategy has been adopted to address the problem.
“The state predominantly suffers from structural unemployment. Meghalaya has the largest pool of people of employable age, and an equally large number of student poised to enter when they finish their education and training,” senior cabinet minister Prestone Tynsong told the Assembly here on Thursday.
However, the structure of development of the economy has thrown up few opportunities in the organized sector outside the government and in the last decade even public sector employment has bottomed out, he said while replying to a motion moved by the Congress legislator from Mawlai Process T Sawkmie.
Stating that Meghalaya also registered a high percentage of literacy rate, Tynsong however said yet the employability rate is dropping which is due to the dearth skill knowledge and experience.
“Therefore there is a need to put more impetus on the development of skill training to the youths of Meghalaya,” he said while adding the exodus of rural students to the cities is another factor that is connected to unemployment.
He further stated that the state also have a vast number of youth with little or no education and skills that are needed to support their livelihoods or to participate meaningfully in any economic activity.
According to him, the problem is also due a high number of students who drop out of school without the minimal skills for productive employment.
“Hardly 15-20 per cent o four youth get absorbed into formal employment. The rest have to find their way into the informal sector or they have to run their own enterprises for survival,” Tynsong said.
Though educational attainment has risen quickly in recent years, he however said gaining a foothold in the labour market remains elusive for many of the youth.
Giving a brief report on the live register of unemployed and vacancies notified in the last five years, the minister said a total of 43,371 live register against 964 notified vacancies in 2017 out of which only one got placement.
In 2016, only 29 out of 46,012 live register got placement out of 1043 notified vacancies, while in 2015, there were total of 46,272 live register, 1704 notified vacancies and 35 placement.
He said that at the state level the unemployment rate is 115 persons out of 1000 persons for the age group 15-29 years that is 11.5 per cent and 11 persons out of 1000 persons for the age group 30 years and above which is at 1.1 per cent.
Highlighting on the steps taken to address the unemployment problem in the state, Tynsong said a three-pronged strategy has been adopted by the state government.
These include generation of self-employment opportunities by providing training/capacity building programmes, bank linkages and enhancing skills as Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana, National Rural Livelihood Mission, Market & Placement Linked Skill Development Initiatives, Apiculture Mission including ADB funded supporting Human Development.
“Provision of daily wages through some programmes such as the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act and provision of jobs in different departments of the government, agencies, private sectors as per the existing norms and policies,” he said.
Apart from this, the minister said that several steps have also been taken up by the different departments and agencies for generation of different type of employment opportunities under different centrally funded and state plan schemes including externally aided projects.
By Our Reporter
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