About 175,900 unemployed youth got linked with employment under the Prime Minister Employment Programme (PMEP) after the programme was introduced last year. According to the Ministry of Labour, Employment and Social Security, 599 local levels have provided jobs to 175,900 youths at 6,864 different community projects run by the local governments. The local levels started the development works under the PMEP after the federal government allocated budget of Rs. 2.36 billion as conditional assistance in the third week of May, this year. The government had allocated Rs. 3.1 billion budget under the PMEP in the last fiscal year.The ministry allocated budget to the local levels based on the number of poor households, population and remoteness of districts.

Speaking at a press conference, Minister of Labour Employment and Social Security Gokarna Bista said that it was an achievement to hook this number of the unemployed youths with employment in the last fiscal year even though it was started in the eleventh hour of the fiscal year. “The employment programme was implemented after completing 86 processes of works. We have spent almost a year to introduce policies, directives, working procedures, establish information centres, selection of employment coordinators to make the programme effective,” Minister Bista said.

He said that local levels deployed the unemployed youths listed in the PMEP in the development works that included road, drinking water and sanitation, tourism, agriculture and irrigation works. “The PMEP programme will be effective to create employment opportunities inside the country and also encourage youths to respect labour and works. I want to request all the concerned stakeholders to play a crucial role from their respective sides to implement this programme to help achieve its objectives,” he said. He said that the ministry has a target to provide at least 500,000 youths under the PMEP programme in the current fiscal year.The budget allocation to the PMEP programme is very nominal based on the total budget allocation, he said, adding that the effectiveness of the programmes to uplift the livelihood of poor families would be vital.

Around 1.7 million youths from 728 local units registered their name in the unemployed list, said Dr. Loknath Bhusal, under-secretary at the ministry at press meet organised to present the progress report of PMEP programme. Based on the registration of unemployed list, the highest number of unemployed youths are in the State-5 followed by Sudurpaschim and State 2. Around 336,557 youths are registered in the unemployed list in State 5, 330,311 youths in Sudurpaschim and 323,636 youths in State 2. Likewise, 259,880 unemployed youths are in Karnali State, 199,068 youths in State-3, 164,556 youthw in State-1 and 87,543 youths in Gandaki State.

Bhusal said that they were still collecting data from all remaining local units as 25 local units have yet to provide data.He said that during one and a half month of the PMEP implementation, the local governments were able to create 2.26 million working-day job for the 175,900 youths. Based on present available data, one person, on an average, gets a minimum of 13 days’ employment, he said.Sudurpaschim State provided job to 34,432 youths, State-5 to 31,958 youths, State-2 to 27, 448 youths, Karnali State to 25, 871 youths, State-3 to 17,619 youths, Gandaki State to 17,495 youths, State-1 17,447 youths. Under-secretary Bhusal said that the programme could not be implemented at some local units due to lack of employment coordinators as the position of coordinators is lying vacant at 108 local units. Under the programme, the government will provide 50 per cent of the minimum salaries of 100 working days as subsistence allowance to anybody, listed in the PMEP, and aged between 18 and 59 years, but fails to get job.

Published on: 2 August 2019 | The Rising Nepal