This Global Guidance Document provides an overview of how educators can prepare students to participate in the just transition to a green and more inclusive economy.

This study by UNESCO-UNEVOC aims at understanding the barriers to the participation of disadvantaged youth in TVET and examines some strategies being used to meet their needs.

This report seeks to answer the question of what works to improve productive employment opportunities and reduce poverty? This question is purposefully broad, as employment-targeted interventions often tackle a wide range of outcomes: the supply of labour that focuses on marketable skills and equal access to productive assets and the demand for labour that focus on promoting entrepreneurship, business development, and market access.

This study exposes failure to factor in gender in COVID-19 education responses and widening gaps in access to quality education following school closures. Citing some 90 countries, the study shows that despite governments' and partners’ swift responses to school closures, remote learning strategies in most countries failed to account for gender-based considerations and barriers that children face at home.

This is the first large-scale use of platform data in the region to inform the extent of women’s participation on e-commerce and how online platforms can benefit women business owners. Developed in partnership with the European Commission, with funding from the Umbrella Fund for Gender Equality and data from one of Africa’s largest platforms, Jumia, the report shows that closing earnings gaps between men and women on e-commerce platforms could add nearly $15 billion to the value of the African e-commerce market. Achieving such gains will require proactive efforts by e-commerce platforms, investors and policymakers, to not only increase the number of women selling online, but also support their growth, including entry into higher-value segments on e-commerce platforms.

This is the first large-scale use of platform data in the region to inform the extent of women’s participation on e-commerce and how online platforms can benefit women business owners. Developed in partnership with the European Commission, with funding from the Umbrella Fund for Gender Equality and data from one of the region’s largest platforms, Lazada, the report shows that closing earnings gaps between men and women on e-commerce platforms could add over $280 billion to the value of the regional e-commerce market. Achieving such gains will require proactive efforts by e-commerce platforms, investors and policymakers, to not only increase the number of women selling online, but also support their growth, including entry into higher-value segments on e-commerce platforms.

This report focuses on STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) and presents findings drawn from the narratives of over 150 young female STEM professionals in seven countries. The report showcases how confidence in their own abilities helps women deal with setbacks. At the same time, the report highlights the critical role that support from parents, mentors, and partners play in women’s success in STEM. Finally, the report concludes that even where training and hiring environments support women in STEM careers, discrimination in day-to-day delivery remains a challenge.

This Note builds on research covering the three countries with the highest concentration of Syrian refugees displaced since 2011: Turkey, Jordan, and Lebanon. It is intended to inform policymakers and practitioners on the barriers that Syrian refugees, especially women, face in securing work to earn a livelihood. This Note highlights initiatives designed to address those barriers, but does not enumerate all of them. While not specifically addressing internally-displaced persons (IDPs) within Syria, this Note could serve as a blueprint for examining and addressing many of the same barriers women face in Syria.

The report explores how entrepreneurship support organizations (ESOs) and other stakeholders can help youth move (refugees and other migrants and displaced youth) fulfill their entrepreneurial dreams and ambitions —creating decent work, driving inclusive economic growth, strengthening communities, and transforming prospects and livelihoods.

This brief examines strategies the World Bank’s ‘Digital Jobs in Nigeria’ pilot project team adopted to help vulnerable youth in conflict-affected areas to leverage employment opportunities in the digital economy. The pilot provides training for unemployed and under-employed youth in Kaduna State to pursue digital jobs, including online freelancing and digital entrepreneurship. The brief specifically highlights the team’s responses to several challenges, including: managing security threats; navigating limited ICT infrastructure; building a local tech ecosystem; adapting to restrictive socio-cultural norms, and integrating local knowledge.

This report brings together the voices and experiences of over 14,000 girls across many continents. It aims at uncovering and understanding their experiences being online: what platforms they use, what is their experience of harassment, who are the perpetrators and the impact of harassment on them.

The blog highlights the World Bank's strategy aims at creating economic opportunities for MENA’s youth by opening-up business environments for young entrepreneurs to compete in free and fair markets for the provision of goods and services.
 

This OECD Short Note explores the connection between consumption patterns, behavior, and gender in achieving a circular economy. It highlights that different consumption habits between men and women can influence the effectiveness of sustainability efforts. The report emphasizes the need for a gender-sensitive approach to encourage behaviors that promote a more circular economy and achieve environmental goals.

Young women in Africa are less likely to be employed than young men, as a result of gaps in access to resources such as skills, time, and capital, and due to underlying social norms. Adolescence is a particularly critical time to intervene, as teenage pregnancy or dropping out of school can have severe impacts on future employment and earnings with significant consequences on their lives. At the macroeconomic level, investing in adolescent girls is also crucial for Sub-Saharan Africa`s demographic dividend.

Humans in the Loop uses the AI annotation market to create livelihoods opportunities for conflict-affected people and communities. This report summarizes how Humans in the Loop is impacting conflict-affected communities by connecting them to digital work programs and training during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Information and communication technologies have long been predicted to spread economic opportunities to rural areas. However, the actual trend in the 21st century has been the opposite. Knowledge spillovers have fueled urbanization and pulled job-seekers into large cities, increasing the gap with rural areas. In this article, the authors argue that new assemblages of technologies and social practices, so-called ‘online labour platforms’, have recently started to counter this trend. 

This report places the notion of social inclusion in an analysis of Africa’s achievements and challenges. Its interdisciplinary approach uses evidence to bring empirical weight to issues that are often debated through advocacy and contestation. It also contributes to the priority areas of a new regional strategy for the Africa region of the World Bank by focusing on women’s empowerment, digital technology, fragility, and climate change, among others.

This policy brief highlights the main results from a GIZ-supported study of the evolving employment dynamics in SSA’s agricultural value chains by Michigan State University. Three main pathways are described that provide job opportunities in agricultural value chains and in the non-farm sectors. Further, the study summarises key entry points for investment and policy actions to promote inclusive, competitive and productive agri-food systems generating employment opportunities and contributing to economic growth and transformation.

This Jobs Solutions Note identifies practical solutions for development practitioners to proactively integrate gender inclusion in digital jobs programs. Based on curated knowledge and evidence for a specific topic and relevant to jobs, the Jobs Solutions Notes are not intended to be exhaustive; they provide key lessons, solutions and approaches synthesized from the experiences of the World Bank Group and partners. This Note draws from S4YE’s 2018 annual report, Digital Jobs for Youth: Young Women in the Digital Economy, highlighting new and emerging strategies to designing gender-inclusive digital jobs interventions for youth. The Note employs a nuanced definition of “digital jobs” to enable practitioners and policy makers to develop a range of interventions tailored to specific contexts and target groups, to improve young women’s employment outcomes from digital jobs programs.

This report assesses the damaging impacts of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic on youth employment in Asia and the Pacific and recommends critical policy responses.