Youth account for 60% of Africa’s unemployed. In Rwanda, 72% of employed youth work for family firms or are self-employed (African Economic Outlook 2016). These outcomes suggest that schools are failing to develop the skills required to enter formal sector jobs or launch and grow small firms. In response, Rwanda is one of ten African…
Entrepreneurship Education and Teacher Training in Rwanda
Relaxing Seasonal Constraints to Improve Labour Productivity
Despite increased investment and international competition in agriculture, small-scale farming continues to be the most common economic activity in many developing countries. In Zambia, 60% of the population lives in rural areas, where 78% of the population were employed in agriculture in 2012 (Zambia Labor Force Survey, 2012). Rainfall patterns in Zambia allow for only…
Urban Density and Labour Markets
Many of the world‘s poorest people live and work in dense informal settlements in Africa’s growing megacities. These communities have both positives and negatives. On one side, settlements, often located in central areas, provide workers with access to geographically proximate jobs, dense informational and social networks, and a large demand base for entrepreneurial ventures. Density…
Impacts of Microfranchising on Young Women’s Occupational Choices
Youth underemployment is a major challenge facing developing nations, particularly in Africa (Filmer and Fox 2014). Young people are more likely to be unemployed than older adults (Kluve et al. 2016). In low-income countries, unemployment figures also typically underestimate the proportion of youths who cannot find productive jobs (Fares et al. 2006). After leaving school,…
Training, Financing, and Matching between Workers and Firms
Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) play an important role in income and employment generation in local economies, and SMEs account for a large share of businesses in low and income countries (LMICs). SMEs in LMICs are concentrated in activities that are described as unorganized or unregistered, or non-institutional. These SMEs have limited access to financial…
A Labour Markets Research Agenda through a Job Search Platform
Labour markets in low-income countries experience many frictions that impair efficient firm-worker matching (Behrman, 1999). Information frictions can hinder firms’ attempts to observe workers’ skills and productivity (Abel et al., 2016; Bassi & Nansamba, 2017; Carranza et al., 2017), spatial frictions can separate firms and workers (Franklin, 2017), regulatory frictions can deter firms from hiring…
Advancing Data Capacity for Policy Innovation in Sudan
The objective of the Sudan Labor Market Panel Survey (SLMPS) 2019 is to facilitate better understandings of labor market dynamics and outcomes in Sudan. Our goal with the SLMPS 2019 is to collect high-quality and reliable data sufficient for indepth, multi-dimensional analyses of economic and labor market issues in Sudan. The need for high quality…
Globalization and the Gender Gap
The third Millennium Development Goal is to “Promote gender equality and empower women.” This goal is given some urgency by the fact that significant gender gaps remain, especially in Low-Income countries (LICs). The World Bank’s 2012 World Development Report, “Gender Equality and Development,” stressed that in the LICs women lag behind men in a number…
Transitions to Adulthood
Increasing schooling, delaying marriage and childbearing, and increasing labour market participation of young women are important policy objectives in Senegal as in many developing countries. These outcomes are tightly linked. Early childbearing may inhibit women’s ability to enter the labour force. Greater schooling and enhanced skill development may substantially mitigate these negative outcomes by increasing…
Girls Empowered by Microfranchising
Integrating young adults into the formal labour market is a major challenge facing developing nations, particularly in Africa (World Bank 2007). High levels of unemployment, especially among youth, have led many policymakers to advocate microfinance (cf Yunus 1999) and other forms of credit market expansion aimed at promoting entrepreneurship. However, empirical evidence on the overall…