Youth employment

ILO signed a cooperation agreement with Renmin University

In a recent UN-wide Global Initiative on Decent Jobs for Youth, ILO will take the lead to scale up action on youth employment for the achievement of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

Press release | 03 December 2015
On 3 December 2015, the ILO Country Office for China and Mongolia signed a cooperation agreement with the School of Labour and Human Resources of Renmin University (SLHR), with the aim of strengthening cooperation in labour market, employment and social protection research in the next five years. The cooperation will cover research, joint events and training programmes, around key decent work issues of common interest, such as youth employment and international labour standards.

China faces multi-dimensional youth employment challenges. The labour force participation rate of youth aged 16-24 was 57.4 per cent in 2010, a sharp drop of 16 percentage points from the year 2000 - the drop only partially reflects more young people pursuing higher education. In 2014, the university graduates reached 7.27 million, more than seven times the number 15 years ago. However, the unemployment rate of young people aged 21-25 was over 16 per cent in 2012 while those with primary education had a far lower rate at 4.2 per cent. China is actively tackling youth employment challenges, but more research is needed to assess the effectiveness of youth employment interventions and services. In a recent UN-wide Global Initiative on Decent Jobs for Youth, ILO will take the lead to scale up action on youth employment for the achievement of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

The formal collaboration framework set up with the SLHR, a leading research and teaching institute on labour issues in China, will unite research capacities and resources of the parties in the world of work and will facilitate the collection of good practices and models of youth employment interventions in China.