La República Democrática del Congo

Focus on Youth Employment

The transitional Congolese government and the international community are making major investments in basic infrastructure in rural and urban areas, while at the same time placing great priority on job creation to support a transition to peace and a newly elected democratic government. This political will for employment creation is demonstrated by the creation of an Employment-Investment policy unit funded under national debt relief budget allocated to the National Employment Creation Programme, which itself was developed with ILO support. Youth employment is a particular concern, as the Head of State wrote in 1995 to the UN volunteering the DRC as one of the lead countries in the Secretary-General's Youth Employment Network.

Activities on Operational and Policy Level

In May 2006, in advance of the first democratic elections to take place in over forty years, the ILO undertook an exploratory mission on job creation and infrastructure development. As a result there is a strong consensus amongst government departments and donors on the need for a support for integrating employment and labour-based approaches into infrastructure development. At the policy level, this programme will support a newly created inter ministerial employment-investment policy unit to assess and monitor employment impact of investment programmes. On an operational level, the ILO support programme would link up to major infrastructure investments providing added value by training small contractors and community contracting associations in labour-based approaches and help integrate ex combatants and urban and rural youth into productive employment.

History

This programme will build on over a decade of experience by the ILO in labour-intensive infrastructure development, which had been interrupted as a result of political instability. In 1991 a UNDP/World Bank financed an ILO feeder roads programme which included elements of road maintenance by agricultural/commercial companies, small contractor development, community-based road maintenance and capacity building of the National Agricultural Feeder Roads unit to manage a decentralized contractor-based feeder road improvement and maintenance programme. It carried out pilot work on sandy soil stabilization and gabion manufacture using labour-based techniques, training of local community representatives and small bridge construction. The geographical coverage was restricted to three regions for security and logistic reasons. The ILO technical assistance team initially comprised a Chief Technical Adviser and a Training Adviser but was reduced to one expert following political instability in 1992. In 1997, the ILO-support to the National Agricultural Feeder Roads unit was integrated into a five year programme entitled "National Programme for the Re-launching of the Agriculture and Rural Sector. This programme was funded by UNDP and executed by UNOPS (United Nations Office for Project Services) with collaboration from FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization) and ILO. The development objectives of this programme were (i) to secure feeding for the population of the country, (ii) to alleviate poverty and (iii) to release a surplus from the production and put it to the disposal of the agricultural industry in order to create remunerated employment in the rural areas and stop migration from rural areas.

Support to Roads Training School

The ILO had also developed a demonstration project for urban employment and basic infrastructure covering three peripheral neighbourhoods of Kinshasa. Unfortunately, this project was closed in 1991 following political rioting. However, the model will be used for developing a new urban employment programme in Kinshasa meant to integrate homeless youth (cheggai) into productive employment

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