Generating more job opportunities to UAE nationals and encouraging them to start up their own small and medium enterprises (SME) come at the top priority of the government national action plan, a senior UAE official affirmed on Sunday.

Nasser Butti Al Shamsi, Director-General of the National Human Resource Development and Employment Authority (TANMIA), told the 101st session of the International Labour Conference of the ILO that the UAE Government was implementing a bundle of initiatives and policies as part of its national action plan seeking to create an attractive, friendly working environment for national human resources at the public and private sectors at short, medium and long term.

Presenting the UAE report to the conference’s committee on “The youth employment crisis: Time for action”, Al Shamsi said : “The UAE Government is developing the local job market to keep pace with latest developments in knowledge economy so as to become one of the world’s most attractive labour markets based on demand and supply equation and availability of job offers especially at the private sector.”

According to him, the government strategy aims to generate young entrepreneurs and promote the culture of investment among youth. Towards that end, a series of government initiatives were launched to offer facilities and incentives to young investors so as to have active, vibrant SME sector. “SME sector is today one of the key growth drivers with a capital of more than Dh3 billion,” he noted.

The 101st session of the International Labour Conference of the ILO, is being held in Geneva (Switzerland) from May 30 to June 15. The Governing Body of the ILO placed an item on “The youth employment crisis” on the agenda of for general discussion.

An ILO report says the world is facing a worsening youth employment crisis. Young people are three times more likely to be unemployed than adults and over 75 million youth worldwide are looking for work. The ILO has warned of a “scarred” generation of young workers facing a dangerous mix of high unemployment, increased inactivity and precarious work in developed countries, as well as persistently high working poverty in the developing world.

In its report on the “Global Employment Trends for Youth 2012”, the ILO examines the continuing job crisis affecting young people in many parts of the world. It provides updated statistics on global and regional youth unemployment rates and presents ILO policy recommendations to curb the current trends.