BY SOLOMON WASSIHUN
Over the last few years, the tuk-tuks, commonly known as Bajaj, have swarmed the main streets of the towns and cities of the nation. Many believe that these three-legged vehicles are rendering our towns increasingly stressful with the noise and air pollution they are causing. On the other hand, some folks have a compelling argument that each of the thousands of tuk-tuks is a job provider for a youth and a sole breadwinner for a family of several members.
A few days ago I stepped into a tuk-tuk and took the fourth and the last vacant seat. The driver’s side door opened and the chauffeur sat behind the wheel. To my surprise, the chauffeur was not a stranger to me. Teshome, around 28, married and a father of two, used to run a small barbershop. I was his loyal customer until ix months ago. How did he end up sitting behind the wheel abandoning his scissors and clippers?
The little room he had rented for4000 Birr per month was not only a barbershop per se. At the shop’s doorstep, one may see a jerrycan full of homemade detergents, and inside one or two used TV sets may be seen sitting on the top of the balcony. He used to augment his daily income as a barber by reselling detergents and used TV sets.
“Last summer, the tax collectors asked me to pay an outrageous sum in income tax. My complaint to the tax office asking for the revision was to no avail. So I decided to close the shop and here I am.” explained Teshome. True or not, that was Teshome’s version of the story of a self-employed barber transformed into a tuk-tuk chauffeur. “I am now a salaryman. And yet, I still manage to pay my bills and send my kids to school. Nevertheless, nothing is more enjoyable than being your own boss. My wife and I are working on a plan to start a mini-restaurant. She is now attending a culinary school, and I am negotiating with a micro-finance office and friends to raise the required money for the start-up. God willing, we are opening the door of our food court by/before September.” he added.
People like Teshome are my heroes. With their little skills and determined entrepreneurial spirits, they always find ways to save themselves and their families from the horror of unemployment or underemployment. Unfortunately, such kind of dynamic and ingenious youth are few and far between among our society. That may explain why we have a high youth unemployment rate particularly in urban areas, which has reached last year 25.7 percent.
During election seasons, like the one we are currently in, political parties promise a range of changes they would deliver if they are voted into power. Be it in the developed or developing world, one of the most highly tantalizing changes election candidates use to lure votes is a reduction in unemployment figures. This so because of the universal truth that unemployment causes numerous personal and social predicaments including poverty, which is by itself the root cause of many social ills like conflicts, crime, family breakups, public health crises… etc.
As the population explosion continues to outpace the economic growth, the figure of unemployed youth is rising year on year. In 2014, the urban youth unemployment rate had been 22.8 percent, way below the present rate. Besides, unlike the situations a few decades ago, these days a substantial portion of the unemployed are educated.
The incumbent government has marshaled huge effort and resources in the fight against unemployment. It has embarked on the execution of a 10-year plan to create 20 million jobs. Even international organizations like the World Bank acknowledge the fact that the government is devoting a high share of its budget to pro-poor programs and investments including job creation and other poverty reduction schemes.
Several government agencies have already been established to facilitate and expedite the job creation works and to help people prosper with the job they created as individuals or groups. These agencies provide start-up, follow up and maturity support to the job creators, in addition to facilitating inputs like financing and working places. Unemployed citizens, based on their preference, either would be assigned to a vacant job in existing firms or would be coached to establish their own private/share/ cooperative with series of training and consultancy services. Over the last 5 years, 76 percent of MSEs created are share associations and while 17 percent are private.
The job creation strategy mainly focuses on the development of MSEs [Micro and Small Enterprises] which are the major job opportunity providing sectors particularly in the urban areas where the current unemployment rate is extremely high.
The government has already made impressive and encouraging progress in creating job opportunities to bring equitable development to society and to improve its economic status. It has benefited numerous unemployed citizens to be self-employed in various sectors including construction, manufacturing, services, retail, and wholesales as well as agriculture. Reports show that over the last 10 months, some 1.5 million jobs have been created in the nation. Even, there are some astonishing success stories in which jobless youth turned out to be proud owners of properties worth millions of Birr.
According to a study report women and college, graduate groups are the two most active beneficiaries of the job creation schemes managed by the government job opportunity creation offices that are broadly organized from federal to at woredas level. The offices are said to provide special treatment to numerous citizens repatriated from the Gulf States as well as job seekers with disabilities.
The decrease in the national unemployment rate from 3.71 percent in 1999 to 2.o8 percent in 2020 is indicative of the fact that the government’s policies and strategies in its fight against unemployment are working quite well. The additional reason to be optimistic about the job reaction policies and strategies is that they are being continuously reviewed based on well-researched recommendations put forward by an advisory council of seasoned experts appointed by the Job Creation Commission.
For instance, the council, in the findings of one of its research works, has recently recommended that the injection of resources to increase access to solar energy to power irrigation pumps would triple productivity and create hundreds of thousands of new job opportunities in the agriculture sector – the sector whose huge potential for creating job opportunities is not yet exploited to the desired level.
Creating jobs is one great achievement, but making them sustainable is another challenge. A recent assessment study conducted on MSEs created between 2015/16 and 2019/20 indicated that 81 percent are the two most active beneficiaries of the job creation schemes managed by the government job opportunity creation offices that are broadly organized from federal to at woredas level. The offices are said to provide special treatment to numerous citizens repatriated from the Gulf States as well as job seekers with disabilities. of those in towns and 75 percent of those in rural areas have maintained their sustainability and are still operating. This is an indicator of the commendable performance of all stakeholders involved in realizing the job creation plan. The government has recently awarded prizes to some financing and training institutes that have demonstrated outstanding and exemplary performance in the implementation of job creation strategy.
Based on the trends of the past five years, the service sector is proven to be the most preferred sector by business starters. And among the service sectors, food and beverage services seem to be the most attractive one as they enjoy insatiable consumer demand. In that sense, Teshome and his wife’s choice to engage in a restaurant business is a wise and realistic one. I cannot wait to be Teshome’s customer once again. This time around, I would be his daily visitor in contrast to the monthly visit when he was a barber. That means I would have more opportunity to listen to his funny small talks and poignant comments on the daily struggle of the ordinary man.
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD JUNE 24/2021
