Is MENA Facing A Talent Or A Job Crisis?- Valutrics

The MENA region faces a growing gap between young jobseekers’ skills and the roles available to them, according to a report by INSEAD Business School, Google and think tank the Center for Economic Growth.

While the new generation is well educated and ambitious, there is a shortage of jobs in the market that match their skills, the report said.

From a demographic point of view, the MENA region is younger than the rest of the world, which is both a blessing and a challenge, said Bruno Lanvin, executive director of global indices at INSEAD.

On one hand, there is energy, creativity and ambition in the new generation; on the other hand creating enough jobs for them is an urgent necessity, Lanvin said.

Technology is a critical dimension of this challenge as the jobs of the future need to be thought of in areas such as artificial intelligence, virtual and augmented reality, and life-long continuous upskilling, according to Lanvin.

Now is the time for governments and business in MENA to implement the required policies to take advantage of the opportunities at hand to support entrepreneurship, competitiveness and innovation across the whole region, Lanvin said.

With the highest youth unemployment rates in the world, the region’s biggest economic challenge is the creation of productive and sustainable jobs for our youth, said Patricia McCall, executive director at Centre for Economic Growth.

A key requirement will be developing the talent of the next generation to be competitive for the global economy, McCall said.

Factors such as embracing technology, enabling the SME ecosystem to thrive, and providing equal access and connectivity, are key ingredients that would help Arab countries leverage the fourth industrial revolution with the many opportunities that lie within the region, said Selim Eddé, head of public policy at Google MENA.

The MENA region has invested considerably in education to improve competitiveness, with an average spend equal to 18% of total government spending versus a global average of 14%, the report said.

The region also shares demographic factors that are either a help and a hindrance, including a high youth bulge (twice the global average), 30% employment in the public sector (versus 10% globally); rigid labor market regulations and a gender gap (men are three times more likely to participate in the workforce than women), it said.

Furthermore, the MENA digital economy stands at 4% of GDP, half of what the US is at (8%) and lags behind the European Union (6%), and youth unemployment is high, according to report.

Recruitment activity in the UAE and across MENA is beginning to gain momentum after a lull in 2016, according to data released by Bayt.com.

Companies in the region have offered thousands of employment opportunities during the first quarter of the year — more than 32,600 fresh positions for jobseekers were advertised between January and March 2017, it said.

The actual numbers are expected to be higher, as the recent data doesn’t take into account the postings made daily through the portal’s CV search tool, Bayt said.