By Garvin Karunaratne
Over twenty percent of young people in the World, have failed to
find a due place in the economic ladder and have become drop offs of the
education and development system. Definite action to equip them to become
entrepreneurs has to get priority. .
Every country has a plethora of job skills training programmes,
but the countries provide only skills training and expect the trained
youth to either find suitable employment or to become entrepreneurs.
Finding suitable employment to utilize their skills is a difficult task because
the International Monetary Fund has already imposed its Structural Adjustment
Programme on almost all Third World countries with the result that these
countries have been directed to follow a set of policies – to allow
unrestricted imports and are banned from implementing any government programmes
that attend to create commercial undertakings. This means that though skills
training can be provided the Governments cannot either restrict imports of
items that can be made locally or set up programmes where the skills trained
youth will be helped to establish manufacturing units that make items for local
consumption or export. The IMF’s Structural Adjustment Programme also imposes a
high interest rate policy, which means that any entrepreneur has to obtain
funds at a for bidding high interest at over twenty percent to establish any
industry.
The result is that the vast majority of the skills trained youth
continue to be unemployed and become consumers, receivers of welfare grants
rather than become contributors.
In this context, the achievement of the Youth Self Employment Programme
of Bangladesh comes of great importance in that it is the only development
programme that can claim success in guiding millions of youths to become self
employed on a commercially viable basis. It is easily the only youth employment
programme that has achieved world status within the short space of three
decades. It is a programme that has left its imprint on the sands of time.
No feasibility reports were written to get this programme
approved. The approval came in a flash.
In Bangladesh when the new Military Government of General
Ershard took over the country in 1982, the Ministry of Youth Development was
providing skills training to 40,000 youths annually but the vast majority of
them failed to find employment and continued to be unemployed for life. I
happened to be the Commonwealth Fund Advisor to the Ministry on Youth
Development and the new Hon. Minister for Labour and Manpower, Air Vice
Marshall Aminul Islam at a Conference held to evaluate youth development
programmes, ordered me,:
What can you contribute for Bangladesh”?
I would suggest that you approve a self employment
programme to supplement the skills training programmes that are being
implemented by the Ministry of Youth Development, where the lecturers who train
the youths in skills will in addition, also guide the youths to establish
enterprises to manufacture items for sale and become self employed
entrepreneurs.”
The Secretary to the Treasury, the highest official in the
country who was present replied:
Self-Employment is not a task that can be done. The
International Labor Organization (ILO) with all their unlimited resources have
just miserably failed to establish a self-employment programme at Tangail in
Bangladesh. They laboured for three years and brought experts from all over and
failed. It was a great loss – a massive expenditure and this Government is not
going to waste any more funds again. Self-Employment is not a task that can be
done. That was the conclusion of the ILO and they are the experts of
international standing”
I replied:
Though the ILO failed, I can establish a Self Employment
Programme. I hold the experience of establishing self-employment projects in
Sri Lanka for eighteen years and also hold the Ph.D in Agricultural Economics
and Non Formal Education from Michigan State University. I am confident of
success.”
The Secretary to the
Treasury the highest official in Bangladesh laughed loud at my attempt to make
entrepreneurs out of school drop outs- the category from which the Department
of Youth Development found youths for skills training. Secretaries of a few
other Ministries joined him.
I argued that though the
ILO failed I would succeed. The Secretary to the Treasury was adamant that
such a programme would never succeed, but I quoted instances where I had established successful
employment projects providing incomes to youths while simultaneously producing
what the country imported. The battle went on for an easy two full hours The
Hon. Minister was listening in silence till his patience was exhausted.
The Minister finally ordered us to shut up. He asked for any Government
training programmes that guided youths to become entrepreneurs. The Secretary
to the Treasury replied None”. Then the Minister asked for the number of
youths that failed to get into higher education as well as finding a suitable
job- the youths that will be scraping the barrel for life, unemployed. The
Secretary answered that it was in the millions, every year The Hon Minister
without any hesitation ordered that I should establish a self employment
programme to create entrepreneurs.
The Secretary to the Treasury stumped, stating‚ that
there will be no funds to establish a self employment programme, to which
I replied that we will find savings within the approved budgets for
the skills training of the youths and re deploy staff as necessary. The
Hon Minister approved my suggestion.. .
We started planning work that night itself. The next morning I
was a addressing trainee at the training centers and also training our
Lecturers and Youth Officers on how the programme should be done. The officers
who had till then done traditional youth development work were trained in
concepts of economics. All Training Institutes were immediately altered to
Training Cum Extension Institutes where the youths in training were to be
guided to become self-employed. Overnight we established a countrywide special
extension service for the lecturers to go out on inspections and help the
youths who faced problems. The youths were guided to draft their own
projects to become self employed, starting small farms even with a few cows or
chicks. Dresses were sewn using the machines at the training centers that were
kept open after work till ten at night. The method was to intensively
guide the trainees in the management of their enterprises. Every action from
the planning of their projects, to the purchase of raw materials, the chicks,
the feed, the process of manufacture, the process of the growth and sale of
cattle, the making of garments and their sale was all monitored on a non formal
education basis where the youths were trained to look at the advantages and
disadvantages of each course of action and act on their own. They were
monitored closely and helped when they failed. . The trainees were taught basic
economics related to their ventures‚ The training included understanding
the free market economy and the youths were guided to think, understand and
increase their ability and capacity in the process. This was non-formal
education in action. The achievement was within the village setting where the
projects became family concerns with brothers and sisters becoming involved. On
our Visits, Training sessions were provided impromptu where everyone could
participate.
The effort was to make a youth movement to make youths establish
ventures and guide them till they are income bearing equal to the earnings of a
clerical officer in the Public Service.
This Programme began at the end of March 1982 with a few
trainees and was expanded to 2000 by October 1983. By the time I left
Bangladesh at the end of October 1983- in sixteen months my team was
guiding 2000 youths. The team comprised the Secretary, the Joint
Secretary of the Ministry with a few hundred staff of Directors, Deputy
Directors of Youth, Director for Livestock and Poultry, Directors of the 3
Residential Training Centers in Livestock & Poultry, Lecturers in Training
Institutes- all of whom were taught the essentials of economics firstly to be
able to analyse the economy of Bangladesh and to arrive at areas of economic
activity where self employment production would be an asset to the country.
They were also taught methods of imparting instructions in a manner that would
evoke the active participation of the trainees and enable them to think and
make their own decisions. This included national and regional planning culled
down to the village level., where the self employment units were established.
We got down to work in earnest.. The officers were patriotic to
the extreme. It was long hours every day for months Daily circuits in Toyota
Hiace bone shakers- leaving early morning to return whenever. The officials
responded ably.
In an evaluation conducted in March 1983, eleven months
from the commencement it was found that of the youths that commenced by May
1982, 283 youths had established their own commercial ventures, with
stocks of flocks and head of cattle valued at Tk.911,630.00. It was
building up stocks, buying chicks and ducklings and seeing them grow. As much
as 223 of them had reached a net income of TK 369.00 a month. Of them 83 earned
over Tk. 500.00 a month. In the Jamalpur District, in disciplines like
dress making, fisheries, retail sales, electrical goods repairing workshops,
welding, etc. 73 youths were involved, earning an average net income of Tk
445.00 a month with 20 of them earning net incomes of Tk. 500.00 or over:”
At that time Tk. 500.00 a month was the salary drawn by a
Clerical Officer in the Government Service. Getting the youths to reach a net
income of Tk. 500.00 was our aim.
In an Evaluation done in August 1983, 16 months from
commencement the Report documented:
A Programme of Excellence in every respect unfolds in the
results documented. .Of 500 unemployed youths who joined the programme in
the early months, 479 are earning an average net income
of Tk 596.00 in August 1983, 8 to 12 months after they commenced their
commercial ventures, 55 of them earn over Tk. 1000.00 a month and 253
earn over Tk 500.00.”
In August 1983, barely 16 months from the commencement, the
achievement was hailed by the two Secretaries of the Ministry of Labour and
Manpower; In their words:
Dr. Karunaratne’s significant contribution has been in the
field of self employment to the drop-out youths. This programme was not only
designed but also guided by him. This activity, which was initially launched as
a pilot experimental project, has been a great success and has now being
adopted as a fill-fledged Programme. The Government of Bangladesh has been
successful in providing meaningful employment to a large number of youths on
this Programme” . (Asafuddowlah)
Dr. Karunaratne’s role as the formulator of the program has
been particularly commendable. It was mainly through his dedication and hard
work that the pilot project has now been formally accepted as one of the most
important development projects.” (Ayubur Rahaman)
The YSEP has stood the test of time for over three decades
(1982-2019) The Five Year Plan of 1997-2002 devotes 8 pages to this
program. This is easily the premier employment creation program that one can
find in the world today. All other programs involve training and apprenticeship
only and never include the tasks of motivating youths, involving them in
non-formal education endeavor to develop their abilities and capacities,
through technical guidance and management advice provided as they work on their
projects aimed at their becoming commercially viable, which are the
cornerstones on which this programme has been based.
Instead of traditional youth work, the aims of the Ministry of
Youth had been altered to facilitate the unemployed youth for gainful
employment/self employment, providing vocational/skills development training
and micro credit support.
To involve the youth in the mainstream of national development
processes” (www.dyd.gov.bd/nyp_activities.php)
The above achievement of the Youth Self Employment Programme
stands great in comparison to what was achieved by the ILO Project in Tangail
in the earlier three years, where the number of entrepreneurs was only 626,
where Tk. 1.38 million was disbursed of which only Tk. .61 million was
recovered. The best cases document people owning one milk cow or fattening one
head of cattle for sale. Many of the 626 people had dropped off.
By August 1983, 16 months after commencement The
Department of Youth Development were training 2000 youths. The
Programme was expanded apace to involve 7000 youths by 1987, to 16,000 by 1992
and to 160,000 a year from 1997. In 1982 we had only 3 Residential
Training Centers. This was increased to 64 by 1997. In 2011
February The Government of Bangladesh reported to the 34 th Session of the
Governing Council of IFAD(FAO) that this programme had guided as much as
two million youths to be self employed‚ on a commercially viable
basis.(Statement by Bangladesh to the 34 th Session of the Governing Council of
IFAD(FAO), dated19/02/2011)
My task was also to train the officers to carry on the programme
after my‚ two year period of service ended.‚ True to a man
Bangladeshi officers carried on the ardous task and‚ today 160,000
youths are being guided annually.. A full Department of Youth Development now
devotes 95% of their time to training and guiding youths to become self
employed..
Every country boasts of skills training programmes where youths
are trained in the thousands but none provide training to guide the trained to
become entrepreneurs- the task that was successfully done in this Youth Self
Employment Programme.
It would behove every Government to decide that all
skills training programmes should include guidance to enable the youths in
training to establish enterprises of their own and become entrepreneurs. This
can be achieved with little extra cost as the staff that train youths in skills
will also be guiding them to become self employed.
Another important fact is that for the first few years, no new
funds were provided. Savings were found within the skills training programme
budgets for holding training workshops to create self employment..
Having a live successful employment creation programme to follow
and for guidance is a great asset to any country that wishes to commence
activity.
The intrinsic success of the Youth Self Employment programme of
Bangladesh offers hope for any country that hopes to convert their unemployed
youth to become entrepreneurs.
The entire world yearns for that development today.
Garvin Karunaratne, Ph.D. Michigan State University‚
Commonwealth Fund Advisor to the Ministry of Labour and
Manpower, the Government of Bangladesh(1981-1983)
