Support to youth empowerment in the informal economy

Youth often are a key target group among vulnerable people, in particular for governments and development programmes. As they are the adults of tomorrow, their exclusion of the social and economic life represents a huge loss of human and economical capital. For this reason, it is of primary importance to support them to fully reach their potential.

The project “Empowering civil society to promote the enhanced socio-economic wellbeing of vulnerable young people in Myanmar”, implemented by Y CARE, aimed to contribute to the social and economic empowerment of vulnerable young people in Myanmar. It consists in:

• Strengthening the capacity of 5 CSOs to meet the needs of young people
• Providing sustainable livelihoods for vulnerable young people
• Empowering young people to participate in community life and decision making
• Reducing stigma and discrimination against marginalised young people

The implementation of the project has led to the identification of a set of barriers to youth participation to empowerment programmes such as the need of a daily income; social pressure to support the family, lack of time, costs of transportation …

According to these elements, Y CARE developed a set of strategies including the following best practices in assisting youth vulnerable people:

• Working closely with beneficiaries and their families through sensitization and home visits to communicate the value of the programme and the changes it could lead to in their lives,
• Payment of transportation costs/provision of bicycles,
• Scheduling of activities with beneficiaries to try as much as possible to fit with their other commitments,
• Shortening of training programme/implementation of some activities concurrently so that young people could realise the benefits more quickly,
• Right-based training and activities to reduce stigma and discrimination against vulnerable groups.
• Working with specialised CSOs to ensure additional support for particularly vulnerable young people with disabilities and LGBTI young people.

More detailed information on this good practice is available at the page 64 of the volume 4.3 “Good Practices and Lessons Learned – Case studies of 15 EC-funded projects”  and in the upcoming newsletter focused on youth empowerment.

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