Jobs and Skills in the Arab Region: E4E as a Promising Model – Part II
As we have already defined the challenges facing youth unemployment and underemployment across the Arab world, we now turn to a good example of a private sector initiative to help enhance skills - the “Education for Employment Initiative for Arab Youth” (E4E). The E4E initiative is a joint engagement between the IFC and the Islamic Development Bank focusing on providing comprehensive solutions to prepare youth in Arab countries for jobs. The program is based on the fact that youth unemployment remains at 25% across the Arab world and that education systems do not adequately address the needs of labor markets. Consequently the graduates are ill equipped for the workplace.
The initiative has a three-pillar strategy including: (a) investment in vocational education and training (TVET) and entrepreneurship training; (b) advisory services to improve the investment climate and regulatory framework for private education; and (c) advocacy for improved targeting of skills to market needs. One of the key objectives of E4E is to increase the supply of work-ready students by improving the access and affordability of quality postsecondary education.
The IFC World Bank Group Advisory program of the E4E Initiative[1] includes eight major projects which are at various stages of implementation/development. Donor partners include DFID, SECO, the Netherlands, and the Islamic Development Bank. The eight projects include:
- E4E ICT Jordan (in implementation)
- E4E FAST in Tunisia, Morocco, Egypt, and Jordan (in implementation)
- E4E Access to Finance Student Lending, in Egypt and Morocco (in implementation)
- E4E ICT Tunisia (pre implementation phase)
- E4E Logistics/Tourism, Morocco (pre implementation phase)
- E4E Regulatory Reform-HEDA, Tunisia (pending approval)
- E4E Regulatory Reform Egypt (in design phase) and
- Career Development Centers & Labor Observatory, Egypt (in design)
While the program faces several challenges, the most pressing challenges include catalyzing and leveraging the many disparate initiatives in the E4E space in the Arab world, unlocking regulatory and ecosystem failures, and identifying existing and new investment potentials in a region with private sector activity integrated in tertiary education.
Read Part I
[1] E4E Briefing, May 2013. https://spark.worldbank.org/docs/DOC-82147.
Rema Nair Balasundaram is a professional in the area of education in Asia and Africa. She has worked extensively, leading operational teams, in the education sector for the World Bank, UNDP, ADB and the IFC. She has led delegations and task forces for technical assistance in Asia and Africa, focusing on primary education, secondary education and tertiary education over the years. She has also led operations and evaluations of Joint, Global and Regional Programs in the Education sector in Asia and Africa. She has graduate degrees in Development management, and Food Science and Nutrition, and a major in Public and Economic Policy.
