Job Matching For Youth In Asia And The Pacific

This report analyzes ways to match youth in Asia and the Pacific with quality jobs and shows why approaches that consider non-linear transitions into and within the labor market can help underpin productivity and social progress. Noting some four out of five young people in the region work informally, it reviews job matching models including commercial and government online platforms, digital bootcamps, and corporate-funded programs. It explains how governments can play an instrumental role, assesses how the private sector reaches untapped markets, and why blended job matching strategies can improve transitions and drive inclusive youth employment.

The Asia-Pacific region’s impressive economic growth and remarkable achievements in poverty reduction have not succeeded in closing gaps in income between the rich and poor, nor the unequal access to, for example, health care and education among other basic services. These gaps disproportionately affect women and the most vulnerable segments of society. They also hamper inclusive growth, undermine social cohesion and contribute to unsustainable production and consumption patterns. In short, these social development gaps undermine efforts to achieving the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.Sustainable Social Development in Asia and the Pacific summarizes the social development gaps as countries in the region take steps to achieve the SDGs, and sketches out a broad regional agenda for a people-centred transformation, outlining some of the key priorities and resources needed. The policy simulations reported here clearly indicate that acceleration of economic growth alone would not address the remaining development gaps. Changing the development paradigm to ensure more decent jobs, complemented by broadened coverage of social protection and universal education and health care is critical for eliminating extreme poverty from the region and achieving the other SDGs. Asia and the Pacific is already the most dynamic region in the world. By harnessing the potential of its people, the region can also be at the forefront of a global social transformation for a prosperous, inclusive and sustainable future for all.

The Social Outlook is a flagship ESCAP publication produced every two years with a dedicated focus on social development issues in Asia and the Pacific. In 2022, under the theme of “The Workforce We Need”, the Social Outlook focuses on building a healthy, protected and productive workforce in Asia and the Pacific to achieve inclusive and sustainable development and build back better after COVID-19 pandemic, particularly in the presence of four key megatrends including climate change, ageing, digitalization and rising inequalities which has already prompted green, demographic and digital transitions that are altering the future world of work. Through its analysis, the Social Outlook aims to strengthen the evidence base and build capacity of policymakers on how to design and expand social protection, active labour market policies and health systems to achieve a resilient workforce today and in the future. The Report is structured along six chapters. Chapter 1 sets the latest social development context in the region highlighting the need for deepening solidarity and rebuilding trust to implement the 2030 Agenda on Sustainable Development. Next, Chapters 2-4 delve into three components of a resilient workforce, namely a healthy, productive, and protected workforce and emphasize the role of such a workforce in inclusive and sustainable development. Chapter 5 discusses policy recommendations for attaining such a workforce in Asia and the Pacific and proposes the renewal of the social contract which can put the region on a path for breakthrough and prosperity. Chapter 6 concludes.

The Springer International Handbook of Educational Development in Asia Pacific breaks new ground with a comprehensive, fine-grained and diverse perspective on research and education development throughout the Asia Pacific region. In 13 sections and 127 chapters, the Handbook delves into a wide spectrum of contemporary topics including educational equity and quality, language education, learning and human development, workplace learning, teacher education and professionalization, higher education organisations, citizenship and moral education, and high performing education systems. The Handbook is grounded in specific Asia Pacific contexts and scholarly traditions, using unique country-specific narratives, for example, Vietnam and Melanesia, and socio-cultural investigations through lenses such as language identity or colonisation, while offering parallel academic discourse and analyses framed by broader policy commentary from around the world.

The unprecedented progress of East Asia Pacific is a triumph of working people. Countries that were low-income a generation ago successfully integrated into the global value chain, exploiting their labor-cost advantage. In 1990, the region held about a third of the world’s labor force. Leveraging this comparative advantage, the share of global GDP of emerging economies in East Asia Pacific grew from 7 percent in 1992 to 17 percent in 2011. Yet, the region now finds itself at a critical juncture. Work and its contribution to growth and well-being can no longer be taken for granted. The challenges range from high youth inactivity and rising inequality to binding skills shortages. A key underlying issue is economic informality, which constrains innovation and productivity, limits the tax base, and increases household vulnerability to shocks. Informality is both a consequence of stringent labor regulations and limited enforcement capacity. In several countries, de jure employment regulations are more stringent than in many parts of Europe. Even labor regulations set at reasonable levels but poorly implemented can aggravate the market failures they were designed to overcome. This report argues that the appropriate policy responses are to ensure macroeconomic stability, and in particular, a regulatory framework that encourages small- and medium-sized enterprises where most people in the region work. Mainly agrarian countries should focus on raising agricultural productivity. In urbanizing countries, good urban planning becomes critical. Pacific island countries will need to provide youth with human capital needed to succeed abroad as migrant workers. And, across the region, it is critical to ‘formalize’ more work, to increase the coverage of essential social protection, and to sustain productivity. To this end, policies should encourage mobility of labor and human capital, and not favor some forms of employment - for instance, full-time wage employment in manufacturing - over others, either implicitly or explicitly. Policies to increase growth and well-being from employment should instead reflect and support the dynamism and diversity of work forms across the region.

Issued three times a year, the Asia-Pacific Population Journal is an invaluable resource containing opinions and analysis by experts on important issues related to population. It provides a medium for the international exchange of knowledge, experience, ideas, technical information and data on all aspects of population.

This edition of the yearly survey examines regional economic and social developments in the Asia and the Pacific region during 2005. The growth rate slowed moderately in 2005 mainly as a result of high oil prices and softening of growth in global trade. For 2006 it is expected that growth maintains its current momentum providing that oil prices do not increase significantly and global external imbalances do not unwind suddenly. Propects for the region would also be affected if avian influenza develops into a human pandemic. Efforts are needed to ensure all benefits of high growth are passed on to the poor via good employment opportunities for all.