Youth Employment Programs - Independent Evaluation Group

Most country strategies only briefly mention youth employment with limitedor no follow-up. In addition, country strategy indicators rarely collectage-specific labor market outcome data. Fragmentation across ministriesand government levels are additional challenges to multisectoral programs.Similarly, within the Bank, few youth employment project teams include stafffrom other relevant sectors. No collaboration between the Bank and IFC wasreported, except a few efforts including planned joint work on the e4e Initiativefor Arab Youth in the Middle East and North Africa.What Is the Evidence on the Effectiveness of Bank GroupSupport to Youth Employment?The international literature on youth employment programs suggests acomprehensive approach works best. A “comprehensive approach” is a multiprongedstrategy that includes complementary interventions aimed atremoving key constraints to youth employment across multiple elements ofthe youth employment spectrum, namely: influencing the job creation andwork opportunities for youth (both demand for youth by firms and selfemployment),labor markets characteristics, and labor supply (skills and laborattributes). In a comprehensive approach, Bank-supported interventions areunderpinned by solid analysis within the given country context.The IEG systematic review of 38 impact evaluations found factors that increasethe probability of success include participation of the private sector,personal monitoring and follow up of individual participants, and a combinationof complementary interventions, such as training with job searchand placement assistance, rather than isolated interventions. Programs thatcombine smoothing the transition from school to work with work-based skillsdevelopment appear to be most effective for youth employment and earningsin countries with a formal sector.In rural low-income areas, where most youth are active in agriculture andnon-farm employment or self-employment, stimulating the market environmentfor growth of farms and rural agribusinesses is essential for youthemployment.There is little evidence of the impact on youth employment-targeted interventionsin labor-abundant, low-income countries with weak institutions,such as those found in Sub-Saharan Africa and parts of South Asia. Circumstantialevidence suggests they are less likely to be effective, and interventionstargeting formal employment may be regressive.The paucity of project data limits the ability to make any statements on theimpact of Bank Group support on labor market outcomes. The majority ofBank projects (55 percent) provide no information on youth as a beneficiarygroup. The rest mainly report input and output indicators. The seven impactevaluations of six Bank projects cannot be generalized. Rather, they focuson specific interventions, such as vouchers for formal vocational training inOverview xv