— Dr. Shankar Prasad Sharma

Vice chairman of National Planning Commission Dr. SHANKAR PRASAD SHARMA has had a long association with the commission. Dr. Sharma spoke to SPOLIGHT on various issues regarding employment opportunities. Excerpts:

What is the present status of unemployment problem in Nepal?

If we see in terms of statistics, it is not very good. There are two different definitions of unemployment in Nepal – total unemployment and under-employment. If we are talking about total unemployment, it is only five percent but under-employment is high at around 32 percent. If we convert the figures of under-employment and adjust it, the total unemployment will come around 17 percent. If we take this data, it is quite alarming. On the top of that we have two problems. Unemployment in urban areas is high and also the unemployment among the educated class. Sometime it is even said that if we send youths to schools and colleges, we are converting them from general unemployed people to educated unemployed ones.

What is the level of unemployment among educated people? Do you have any statistics?

We don’t have specific statistics about unemployment of educated people since the labor force survey does not do such type of analysis. It is very difficult to say about that. If we look at the volume of urban unemployment, it is close to 14 to 15 percent.

Don’t you see any possibility of mobilizing these educated but unemployed people in a nationwide literacy campaigns so that people at large as well as these unemployed can benefit?

This year we have also done that. In some of the selective districts, what we have said is that depending upon the output in literacy; such people will get job as well as remuneration. The remuneration will be performance and output based. Similarly, we are using national volunteers recruiting from local level and central level. We don’t have enough money. From next year, we will also initiate vocational training program through the support from Asian Development Bank. We are working on the modalities to give skill and entrepreneurial training to youths as much as possible. We are in the process to collect the data of youth unemployment in the country.

We have seen many political upheavals brought about by these unemployed youths. Don’t you see these unemployed people are going to be a breed ground for permanent instability?

I agree with that point but it is like a chicken and egg problem. We have to have stability to generate 7 percent of growth rate in the country. We should have good strategy, which will come only through good leadership. Both the parts are missing in Nepal. If we have instability of this kind, even if different governments introduce different programs, they are not going to be sustainable. Such programs will only be half-hearted. We have seen that many governments and their good programs died down because of instability. First of all we need to have political stability. We have all the potential to grow by 7 percent or more. If we can generate the 7 percent of growth and reorient our programs, we can absorb all our unemployed people. I am not pessimistic about the situation since we can still do a lot.

What specific programs does the government have to provide employment to educated youths?

We have four different kinds of programs in addressing the unemployment problems. One is basically entrepreneurship development. We have skill development program and higher education program but they don’t have any component in encouraging entrepreneurship. Various researches and reports show that because of lack of such component in the education system, even educated youths are not getting employment opportunities. Despite the large number of higher education programs and vocational development programs, hardly few people think about developing self-employment.

What are other problems?

Second problem is that there is no employability among the educated masses. We have been spending a lot of money in education and vocational training programs but they seem to be incompetent. Annually, government spends close to Rs.1 billion in vocational training. We have programs within the Ministry of Labor, Ministry of Industry, Ministry of Agriculture, Center for Technical Education and Vocational Training (CTEVT) and others. If we tally the programs with the demand of the market, there is where the real problem lies. We are giving training in one area but the market demand is in another. There is a mismatch between demand and supply. We also have problems in what employment framework says about equality. We are supposed to start the programs to benefit disadvantaged groups, poorer people, people of deprived and backward communities. Mostly people who live in district headquarters are benefiting from our programs.

Do you have any new plans for increasing employment opportunities?

In the last four or five years, we have improved upon policy making in employment as one of the focus area of overall development objectives of the country. This means employment mainstreaming in development activities. It is not easy to do. Only those countries, which have high economic growth, can absorb huge number of people. That part we are missing especially over the last four or five years. During early 1990s the economic growth rate was above 7 percent but that has also slowed down.

Do you see any special areas for employment generation?

There are certain areas where we can generate the mass employment like road construction and other labor-intensive sector. We need to employ people in income generating activities. In the Maoist affected areas, we want to mobilize users group in various programs in rural areas. For instance, we have increased the food for work program. Similarly, other donors are also trying to generate employment opportunities and income generating activities. We also have quick impact programs in many districts. We have reoriented a number of programs towards the income generation activities in the rural areas. We are trying to work on micro-enterprise programs and we are expanding it to 10 districts. We implement the programs on the basis of resources available and demand of the districts. Similarly, other programs are also reoriented looking at the demand of the market. In foreign employment sector, we are providing training. These are some areas where we need to improve.

How do you see the rate of return from higher education?

We have spent a lot of money in the higher education sector but that has neither created the entrepreneurship ability nor any salable scheme. That one is very difficult to change. To change the education system and introduce saleable schemes, it takes time. We have to build entrepreneurship in the education system. Otherwise, it will lead us to nowhere. But some of the Universities like Kathmandu University have focused in this area and are producing students that can enjoy demands of the market. Those students who graduate from such colleges and universities do not have any problem in securing the employment. Other universities and colleges need to change their old practices. We are also trying to change the labor law giving more opportunity to the Nepalese laborers. Because of existing rigid laws, they cannot employ Nepalese for short term.

What are other areas for meeting the demands?

Enhancing the foreign employment is another area. In the last couple of years, the number of Nepalese heading towards the foreign countries is increasing. It should be encouraged. We are also receiving more remittances from these workers. We also want more value added so that more remittance can be received from the same number of foreign workers. We have already started the training programs for people going for the foreign employment.