This report on youth employment and sustainable development identifies and enumerates best practices, historical evidence of lessons learnt and an agenda for the future. The focus is on providing a comparative analysis of the North African countries, which share the experience of significant youth unemployment issues and elusiveness of sustainable development. Unemployed and underemployed youth can become restive, disillusioned, and frustrated. Their frustration could be explosive, as witnessed in Tunisia, Egypt and other countries where they led uprisings against governments that were perceived as uncaring and unresponsive to their economic and social needs. The challenge is not just to provide employment opportunities, but to provide decent jobs and reduce the significant insecurity experienced by underemployed and overexploited workers who earn low wages and see no possibility of meeting their needs through gainful employment. The report analyzes seven case studies covering North African countries and provides policy recommendations to promote youth employment for enhancing sustainable development.
