Impact of the economic and financial crisis on the skills and employability of young people in the Arab region

While recognizing the variety of challenges facing individual countries, the common problem identified across the Arab region is that investments in education and training are not yet resulting in satisfactory levels of productive employment. Young people face uncertainty in moving from education into decent work. Enterprises often have trouble finding enough people with the skills they need to be able to expand their business or adopt new technologies. Also, the opportunities for employment growth due to industrial diversification and trade patterns may be jeopardized because skills development systems are not oriented towards preparing the workforce for the labour market of the future.