Opportunities for Youth Employment (OYE) in Mozambique, Rwanda and Tanzania

In Tanzania, Rwanda, and Mozambique, unemployment rates for youth are 2-3 times higher than those of adults, with an even higher rate of unemployment among young women. Furthermore, poverty levels in these three countries range from 45 to 68%, according to the World Bank. The vast majority of rural youth depend on 'vulnerable' employment in subsistence farming, and informal self-employment without a stable income or the opportunity for professional development or long-term growth. Consequently, many rural youth migrate to urban centers in search of work, but often they lack an adequate skill set or clear understanding of the needs of the market.

SNV is implementing the OYE project in Rwanda, Tanzania and Mozambique with the aim to improve the livelihoods of 27,050 rural, out-of- school young people through skills training in a way that fuels their own aspirations as well as the needs of local agriculture, renewable energy and water & sanitation businesses. The OYE project targets underprivileged rural out-of-school youth aged between 18 - 24 years, with at least 40% of them being young women.

With the Opportunities for Youth Employment (OYE) project, we aim to sustainably increase youth employment and incomes by: providing skills and capacity development (push factor); linking youth to market opportunities for employment and enterprise development (match factor); and selecting opportunities in growth sectors that have concrete potential for employment creation (pull factor). We work with youth organisations, vocational training centers, local government, and business associations to identify young people who are out-of-school and unemployed and then coordinate with training providers to carefully screen and select disadvantaged young people to participate.

The OYE project is implemented by SNV in partnership with the Mastercard Foundation and the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation.