The International Labour Organization (ILO) and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Agency (UNHCR) signed a joint collaboration for piloting the Entrepreneurship Training for Indonesian Entrepreneurs and Refugees titled “Ready for Business Training Programme” in Jakarta on 4 September 2018. The joint collaboration was signed by Michiko Miyamoto, ILO Director for Indonesia and Timor-Leste and Thomas Vargas, UNHCR Representative in Indonesia.

The signing was witnessed by the rector of Atma Jaya Catholic University and the representative of Dompet Dhuafa as the implementing partners of this entrepreneurship training. Atma Jaya University is a leading private university in Indonesia and Dompet Dhuafa, a non-profit organization focusing on education, health, economy and social development.

“This ILO-UNHCR partnership is inspiring and I believe we can achieve a lot of good results through this partnership. This partnership will be the voice of the voiceless, particularly for Indonesian youth and refugee youth. The skills that they acquire in this training will be useful for them in the future when they are planning to open a business” stated Michiko Miyamoto during the official signing of the collaboration.


Meanwhile, Thomas Vargas said that this joint partnership was a perfect example of joint initiatives between UN organizations to give back to the community and to the country. “Better life starts with education. We are pleased to be part of this joint collaboration as it gives opportunities for the refugees to share their knowledge and experiences to the country and to the Indonesian youth; while at the same time the Indonesian youth can also share their initiatives and capabilities,” he said.

Around 200 participants aged 17-30 years old are selected to participate in the 6-month ready for business training programme from September 2018 until February 2019. The participants consist of 100 Indonesian youth and 100 refugee youth. All participants should join 40 training sessions with a duration of 2.5 hours per session.

These trainings are being facilitated by facilitators from Atma Jaya University and Dompet Dhuafa who have been trained in using the ILO’s training tool named Community-Based Enterprise Development (C-BED). C-BED is a low cost, easy to implement training programme to help entrepreneurs and business owners plan, develop and improve.

The training sessions cover five key entrepreneurship themes that are important in developing enterprises: 1. Getting started with entrepreneurship; 2. Dealing with marketing and sales; 3. Managing your business; 4. Focusing on finances; and 5. Preparing for the future.

In addition to in-class training, the programme utilize the social media to provide micro learning and to encourage active as well as interactive participation from the participants. The participants will also do community activities throughout the training programme and will be inspired by successful local entrepreneurs sharing their experiences in developing businesses.