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28 March 2024

Jobless Alert: 9 UAE, Gulf firms will make you job-ready

In 2014, the bank’s net profit increased by 58 per cent to reach Dh5.13 billion while the group’s total income climbed 22 per cent to Dh14.44 billion. (Shutterstock)

Published
By Waheed Abbas

Here is a good news for the jobless youth in the UAE and other Mena countries for they’ll have an opportunity to get required skills for the jobs from the best local companies from a wide range of sectors and get ready for the jobs.

Companies from hospitality, oil and gas, healthcare, telecom and other sectors have joined hands to train 100,000 youth job-ready by 2017 across the region.

Among the nine companies which will train the jobless youth, four are from the UAE and the rest from other regional countries.

The UAE companies which have stepped forward to train and get the youth job-ready are Jumeirah Group, Crescent Petroleum, Crescent Enterprises and VPS Healthcare Group. Companies from others countries are Abdul Latif Jameel, Alghanim Industries, Consolidated Contractors Company (CCC), Olayan Financing Company, and Zain Group.

This move was initiated at the World Economic Forum where the companies have committed to collectively offer skilling opportunities to 49,000 people.  These commitments meet nearly 50 per cent of the World Economic Forum’s Regional Business Council (RBC) New Vision for Arab Employment Initiative of skilling 100,000 young people by 2017.

Through this project, the jobless youth will have an opportunity to continuous learning, training and job-readiness which would see involvement of businesses and with education institutions, civil society and governments.

Mena region faces critical challenge of youth unemployment because estimates show that nearly half of Mena’s 381 million residents are below the age of 25 – the world’s highest regional youth unemployment rate.

The Human Capital Index 2015, released last week by the World Economic Forum, showed that despite significant investment in education by many countries, the region is not equipping young people with skills for the 21st century.

UAE-based Crescent Enterprises CEO Badr Jafar said: “Creating new jobs alone cannot address our regional crisis of youth unemployment and underemployment. Equally important is the need to enhance the employability of our youth by equipping them with relevant skills to fill that vital gap, as well as empower them with a spirit of entrepreneurship.”

Omar Kutayba Alghanim, Chairman of the Regional Business Council, said: “We have made a strong start, but it is only a start. If we are going to fundamentally tackle the employment challenge in the region, it will require wider public-private collaboration across the Mena region.”

(Image via Shutterstock)