The Prime Minister, Tshering Tobgay, said there are enough jobs in the market if the youth are willing to take it up. He was speaking at the launch of the Guaranteed Employment Programme (GEP), where hundreds of hopeful job seekers had turned up, today.
GEP replaces Unemployment Benefit Scheme; one of the pledges of PDP government.
The Ministry of Labor and Human Resources will implement three different schemes under the GEP: direct employment, provide employment skills and overseas employment.
The programme will focus on economic sectors such as construction, agriculture, Hydropower, tourism, ICT, health, education and training. It will also target financial services, production and manufacturing, and automobile, among others.
Once employed under the programme, the government will provide a minimum of Nu. 7,500 and the rest will have to be borne by the employers.
The scheme is for unemployed university graduates and class 12 and 10 graduates.
The government will provide the financial support for two years.
A total of Nu. 5.50 million will be allocated from the Economic Stimulus Plan package under the special support scheme.
To kick start the programme, a contract agreement between some of the employers and the employees was signed.
Today, the youth unemployment stands at 9.6 percent, which means 4,500 youth between 15-24 years are unemployed. More than 1,00,000 job seekers are expected to enter the job market by the end of 11th FYP. The government will have to create 82,000 jobs to achieve full employment status of 97.5 percent.
