Skills mismatch must be tackled to boost youth employment

AS WE celebrate Youth Day on June 16 and Youth Month throughout the month of June, we really need to take a closer look at youth development and invest in meaningful skills development to empower young people for meaningful economic involvement.

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We are experiencing high youth unemployment in the country but on the other side there are certain skills shortages critical in the economy.

We cannot continue talking about the shortage of skills in a country with free education and when our tertiary institutions are overflowing with students year in and year out.

This means there is something we are doing wrong somewhere as a country.

We need to sit down and assess the required skills and encourage our youth to prioritise the fields of study to close those gaps and meaningfully contribute to the socio-economic development of the country.

If we can encourage our young people to get the skills required by the economy, we definitely will reduce the high youth unemployment in the country.