5th African University on Youth and Development

The issue of employment is of great concern for young people from around the world, and particularly from the African continent. Inspired by the Declaration of Malabo "Creating Employment for Accelerating Youth Development and Empowerment” for the autonomy of youth, conference participants conclude and recommend the following:

To the Governments

• Promote a legal framework that creates decent employment and guarantees minimum security standards and dignity for public and private jobs.
• Enact policies that facilitate social entrepreneurship and create social enterprises to gratify those with innovative ideas and entrepreneurial initiatives.
• Strengthen training programs that facilitate labour market entrance for young people.
• Promote technical and vocational education, and expand the number of schools of arts and sciences.
• Improve policies to facilitate access to banking credit for youth, in order to foster entrepreneurship and the creation of small businesses.
• Adapt labour laws to meet current job market requirements and ensure economic growth and poverty reduction
• Establish an official minimum wage in all African countries.
• Regulate and universalize curriculum based internships to facilitate the transition from the educational system to the labour market.
• Promote the culture of responsibility and work ethics.
• Increase the involvement of universities and vocational schools in the transition process into the labour market.
• Incorporate entrepreneurship in the educational curriculum.
• Facilitate mobility of young people to areas with higher employment opportunities.
• Reinforce auditing inspections of labour contracts.

To the social partners, employers and trade unions

• Comply with the labour laws.
• Strengthen the social dialogue between employers and employees.
• Reinforce participation of trade unions and youth associations in combating work exploitation.
• Comply with tax regulations in order for governments to invest in social policies.
• Conduct a competitive, open and transparent recruitment and selection process, based on merit.
• Foster accountability among employers and unions to guarantee decent youth employment and safeguard their rights.

To the Youth

• Invest in specialized professional training.
• Adapt a culture of work and effort to have a dignified life and contribute to the development of the community, nation, continent and world.
• Be proactive and flexible in job search.
• Bet in social entrepreneurship.
• Strengthen social, civic and political participation.
• Become involved and participate in youth organizations that increase links of association and cooperation to protect youth interests.
• Exercise self-improvement, self-development and self-criticism.
• Engage in self-training when faced with inactivity. Comply with the labour laws.

To the international community

• Eliminate child labour and any kind of exploitation of minors.
• Establish conventions that guarantee decent work for all, paying particular attention to youth.
• Monitor and support public employment policies of Governments.
• Harmonize labour market information systems to facilitate formulation, execution and evaluation of employment policies.
• Guarantee a favorable international environment for social entrepreneurship and decent youth employment.
• Facilitate international mobility to create more employment opportunities for youth.
• Expand social protection for youth and their families to reduce their vulnerability, in particular for populations at risk.
• Create a competitive global market based on merits, regardless of origin, culture, ethnicity or gender.
• Promote exchanges of success stories and best practices related to youth employment among African countries.
• Encourage cooperation between countries so that workers can practice their professions abroad under the same legal conditions.