Pacific missing gravity of youth unemployment issues:SPC

Transcript

The Secretariat of the Pacific Community says countries in the region must improve their collection of data on youth in the Pacific.

A social development advisor for youth at the SPC says the lack of data in the region is disguising the gravity of many issues  youths face in the Pacific.

Mereia Carling says an area of particular concern are high unemployment rates among the region's growing young population.

TRANSCRIPT:

MEREIA CARLING: So we're actually addressing the drivers for investment. What do we need to encourage donors, and development partners, and governments to start putting money in areas that we need for youth development. And one of the key areas is around statistics; we've really got to focus on the data because at the moment we can't really see statistically what the situation is for youth very clearly. We need to put a lot of work into what questions we ask in a census or demographic health survey to know what's happening with young people. So that's a big area that we really want to focus on the evidence, really get hard evidence so that we can then start to show where the red flags are in the region and where investment needs to be made. So that's one big area, and another area is that we want to work in partnership with young people, so right from the beginning we've been involving young people, the Pacific Youth Council works in partnership with the Secretariat of the Pacific Community to manage the regional coordination aspect of this framework. And we work hand-in-hand, it's a true and honest partnership, we're both responsible for looking for resources for doing this work.

KOROI HAWKINS: And going back to the question of the allocation of resources by government and by NGOs to youth. The other thing that you often see in Pacific countries is the lack of opportunities for youth, not just in terms of opportunities for employment, but also things to do, study opportunities, there's quite a lack of that. Is that something  that's addressed?

MC: Yes, very much so, I mean there's four pillars in this framework and one area is around education and employment and within that they're looking at opportunities for internships, apprenticeships, volunteering, but also just looking for entrepreneurial skills in formal and informal sectors, so there's that whole side as well and then, as I said before, we're partnering with youth and we want to bring the engagement of young people right across the board. The other areas of the framework are in health, in climate change and environmental management, sexual reproductive health, mental health, and non-communicable diseases. What we want to do is bring a youth focus to those sectors, there's already resources and expertise, there's a programming traction that's happening, but there's not much youth engagement. When we can bring in young people's engagement into these sectors we can provide opportunities in that way.

KH: You said there is a lack of data, but the high birth rates in many of the Pacific Island countries mean the demographics of Pacific populations are increasingly becoming younger. Is that something that countries are aware of and are looking at in terms of getting that young population engaged in the greater workings of the countries?

MC: Yeah, I mean it's something that demographers and statisticians say a lot, that we have this youth bulge. When you look at the population pyramids there, they're broad based [with] a large youth population. I have to say it's not right across the board, in some of the territories that SPC covers the reverse happens. We have a sort of a concave thing happening where the youth population emigrates out of the country to other countries in search of employment opportunities. But whatever happens, it's dynamic, if it's a bulge or if it's concave the youth population is dynamic and those dynamics really need to be understood for any government and any policy. It's not well understood, it's not well addressed, sometimes countries may say 'young people can do that' but they don't really understand why young people, for example, might not want to be involved in farming as a labourer. We need to have slightly more detailed conversations with young people to find out where the opportunities are that we can engage this population or understand the dynamics of the population whether it's increasing or decreasing. So another part of the youth framework is about having dialogue at high levels, and having the right conversations involving young people and really trying to understand the nature of the youth issues and nature of development so that we can find where the opportunities are. We need to get in touch with governments right across the region, who have been involved in the development of this, to sort of reintroduce them to what it looks like now and how they can engage.