Investing in Youth Employment Report

Approximately three-fourths of the world’s 1.5 billion young people live in developing countries. Globally, young people make up nearly half of the ranks of the world's unemployed. Unemployment rates for these younger youth are over three times as high as they are among adults as reported in ILO’s Global Employment Trends for Youth 2010. The situation of young people today presents the world with an unprecedented opportunity to accelerate growth and reduce poverty. Investing in their human capital could become the basis for sustained economic and social development. The richness young people possess reflects in their capacity to inject new energy, talent and idealism that can shake up status quo, find new solutions to old problems and question some fundamental flaws in our societies often reflected in socio-religious-econo-political orders that tend to exploit individuals across the world. The Commonwealth Secretariat and member governments working together with civil society are a powerful force for democracy and development.