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VP Mujuru said no country could develop when its young people were entrapped in cycles of poverty, unemployment and underemployment.
She made the remarks while officially opening the national conference on youth skills for employment, entrepreneurship and industry growth in Harare yesterday.
“No nation can boast of having a bright future when its youths are constrained by social and cultural tendencies that hinder their progress,” said VP Mujuru.
“A concerted and co-ordinated effort is required by Government, non-governmental agencies, private institutions, youths groups and churches to address youth issues in a comprehensive way.”
The three-day conference, that ends tomorrow, is being attended by youths, officials from the private sector and business experts with a view of finding strategies that ensure development and empowerment of youths.
VP Mujuru said Government resources were not adequate to cover all programmes needed by the youths hence the need for support.
“It is not simply a Government concern, it is everyone’s concern. It is in this context that we encourage the corporate sector and developmental agencies to provide technical and financial support for youth programmes,” said VP Mujuru.
“The process of developing a well-rounded young person who is able to participate fully in the development of the economy cannot fall on Government alone.”
Government, she said, was simply a facilitator for a suitable environment for various stakeholders to work together.
VP Mujuru said the timing of the conference was ideal as it had come hard on the heels of the launch of the revised National Youth Policy by President Mugabe last Saturday.
“This conference seeks to foster an enabling environment for integrated visioning and planning for youth development and empowerment among stakeholders,” she said.
She added: “As part of this Government launched the revised NYP. The policy highlights the priorities and strategies to be adopted by Government and stakeholders to ensure empowerment of youths.
“The key aims of this conference are in line with aspirations of the youth policy.” VP Mujuru said stakeholders should always share experiences and good practices on skills development and youth empowerment.
“The mixture of people of different expertise present here reflects that issues relating to our young people require global attention and are indeed on top of everyone’s agenda.
“This is a critical time when our economy is on the road to recovery. As we seek to expand and grow the economy, we need to start looking at the skills needed to move the nation forward.
“We need to strengthen our training institutions at both the infrastructure and human capacity level,” she said.
The Vice President said the school curriculum should also be modelled in a way that it becomes responsive to the needs of industry.
“In the absence of such a link, the graduands we produce will find themselves unemployed, unemployable and unable to enter the job market because the skills they possess are not required by industry.”
Chief Secretary to the President and Cabinet Dr Misheck Sibanda said the Graduate Entrepreneurship and Employment Promotion Programme (GEEPP) launched by Government recently had a strong “synergistic relationship” with the conference as it sought to address the problem of youth employment focusing on graduates.
“You are all aware that following the establishment of several State and private-run universities our country has been producing an average of 14 500 graduates from universities and 7 000 from polytechnics per year,” he said in a speech read on his behalf by his deputy, Mr Justin Mupamhanga.
“Of these only 10-15 percent have been accessing employment, the rest remain unemployed . It is an untenable situation and concerns have been raised at the highest level of Government to have responsive polices and strategies in place.”
Online Reporter