October 13, 2007 ABSTRACT Timor Leste is currently preparing its children and youth for jobs that do not yet exist, using technologies that have yet to be applied (if they have been invented elsewhere), in order to solve problems that are not even known they are problems yet: Will the economy create jobs for nationals or expatriates as the case has been in all other small oil-based economies?  The World Bank in cooperation with local stakeholders and international donors is assisting the Government of Timor Leste to address pressing issues in the area of youth. As part of its assistance, the World Bank has prepared three reports on “Situation Analysis and Policy Options for Timor Leste’s Youth in Crisis”, “Timor Leste: A Policy Note on Safety Nets” and “Timor Leste: Youth Development and the Labor Market”. This note summarizes the findings and options presented in the latter report.
The report focuses, first, on the preparedness of the young Timorese to join the labor market. It finds that, notwithstanding recent gains in education, still too many young Timorese reach adulthood with no education (probably around 20 percent) and only 12 percent complete secondary education. And though there has been a healthy trend to diversify education and training and expand private tertiary education, these developments are taking place in the absence of accreditation schemes and statistics to monitor their impact. The situation is aggravated by the use of multiple languages at home, schools, and in the more modern parts of the private sector. The report then examines the readiness of the labor market to receive and absorb the youth. It finds that the labor market is small to absorb the high number of new job seekers - a result of high fertility and an increasing share of educated youth who aspire to move away from the traditional sectors and informality, especially agriculture. Neither, is the future impact of economic growth on employment promising. The private sector is small and has barely increased in the last few years. Some of the major infrastructure development projects (such as electrification) may make only marginal contributions to labor absorption. The growing oil sector is likely to be capital intensive while its labor requirements will be for specialized skills that are not locally available at least in the short run. The prospects of agriculture are also mixed. If agriculture acts as an employer of last resort under present conditions (such as existing techniques and mix of farm output), it will absorb excess employment but will do so at decreasing farm incomes. If, on the other hand, agriculture engages in efficiency enhancing measures (such as mechanization), it will increase output and farmers incomes but will not necessarily require additional employment... Access the Report
 Download the Full Report (277kb pdf) This report is available in Portuguese (295kb pdf), Tetum (286kb pdf) and Bahasa (296kb pdf) |
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