Boosting entrepreneurial skills and opportunities
GenU will support every young person to have access to a decent livelihood—anywhere, anytime—by building and scaling sustainable entrepreneurial ecosystems.
With the onset of COVID-19, governments found themselves grappling with how to balance saving lives with safeguarding livelihoods. Nearly half of the global workforce is at risk of losing their livelihoods, where young workers who are mostly in the informal economy experience disproportionate impact. Some 96.8 per cent of all young workers in developing countries are in the informal economy and more than 126 million young people in emerging and developing countries are working but living in extreme or moderate poverty.
According to the International Labour Organisation, 17 per cent of respondents who had been employed before the pandemic have stopped working altogether, and 42 per cent reported a reduction in income.
As the world struggles to recover from this global pandemic and its devastating impact on the economy, boosting entrepreneurship skills and opportunities among young women and men has become even more important and urgent. The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the global economy’s need for creating new markets and avenues that did not exist before and young people are keen to co-create the solutions.
Entrepreneurship has the ability to improve standards of living and create wealth—not only for young people, but also for related communities and businesses. Youth-led micro and small enterprises are vital in countries with limited formal employment and in contexts where there is insufficient job creation in the market. Youth entrepreneurship also serves as a tool leading to sustainable economic growth and social development.
GenU will support every young person to have access to a decent livelihood – anywhere, anytime, while ensuring political and institutional commitments. We can achieve this by building sustainable entrepreneurial ecosystems and scaling-up world-class entrepreneurship solutions that meet young people’s unique levels of ability and context. These solutions primarily include entrepreneurship skill-building programmes through formal and non-formal education systems as well as innovative financing for youth start-ups—efforts that promote entrepreneurial ecosystems, networks, and business social capital.
