MULTI-STAKEHOLDER ASSESSMENT OF YOUTH PERCEPTION AND DEVELOPMENT Development Food Security Activity (DFSA)
MERCY CORPS March 2018
Prepared by Lauren Servin
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Table of Contents
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ...... 5 Background ...... 5 Assessment Overview ...... 5 Key Findings ...... 6 Recommendations ...... 8 1 INTRODUCTION ...... 11 1.1 Background ...... 11 1.2 Development Food Security Activity (DFSA) ...... 12 1.3 Youth component under DFSA ...... 12 2 OBJECTIVES & METHODOLOGY OF ASSESSMENT ...... 13 3 BACKGROUND TO YOUTH SITUATION IN ETHIOPIA ...... 17 3.1 Education ...... 17 3.2 Employment ...... 17 3.3 Access to Land ...... 17 4 ASSESSMENT FINDINGS ...... 18 4.1 Community Perception of Youth Equity, Agency, Empowerment & Development ...... 20 4.2 Implementing Partners Perception of Youth Equity, Agency, Empowerment & Development . 28 4.3 Government Perception of Youth Equity, Agency, Empowerment & Development ...... 33 4.4 OVERALL ANALYSIS ...... 41 5 CONCLUSIONS ...... 44 6 RECOMMENDATIONS ...... 45 6.1 General Recommendations ...... 46 6.2 Recommendations specific to youth livelihoods programming ...... 47 6.3 Livelihood Options ...... 48 6.4 Recommendations for community engagement ...... 50 6.5 Gender Specific Pre-Requisite Activities...... 51 6.6 Recommendations for DFSA ...... 51 6.7 Recommendations for government engagement ...... 54 ANNEX A: AGGREGATED DATA FROM COMMUNITY FGDs ...... 56 ANNEX B: REFERENCES ...... 62 ANNEX C: Tools ...... 63 ANNEX D: Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment SoW ...... 76
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
First and foremost, we would like to acknowledge and thank USAID for supporting to this study to better be able to inform the project on the current perceptions of youth. We greatly thank the team who provided support in completing this assessment, especially the lead. We would also like to extend thanks to the all of respondents from the Community Focus Groups and the Individual Community respondents, who provided their time to openly answer the questions of this study. We would also like to respectively and graciously thank the government officials in Dire Dawa Zone, Arsi & Wester Arsi Zones and East Hararghe Zone, who took valuable time out of their working schedule to provide valuable and in-depth information related to the work of their offices and their perceptions of young people in their administrative areas. We also extend sincere thanks to the Implementing Partners HCS and MCS, who provided further insights to the situation of young people in their areas of operation and also deeper insight into their organizations. We would also like to thank the various enumerators who spent long hours asking the survey questions and collecting data, which was used as the main substance for this report. Finally, I would like to sincerely thank the team from Mercy Corps, whom have played a huge role in making this study possible and who have facilitated each and every aspect of the study by providing managerial, logistical and technical support.
About the Author Lauren Servin is a youth entrepreneurship and youth employment specialist who has been managing youth programs for over 11 years in East Africa. Most recently she was the country manager for a youth entrepreneurship organization called SPARK, where she was responsible for developing innovative solutions for employment challenges facing youth. This also involved developing and managing programmes related to the enabling environment for youth enterprises and entrepreneurship in South Sudan. She has an additional expertise in agri-value chain analysis and development also geared toward creating jobs for youth, training curriculums for youth entrepreneurship and Access-to-Finance for youth enterprises. She graduated from New York University’s Wagner School of Public Policy, with a with a Master’s in Public Administration, with a specialization in International Development Policy. Presently, Lauren consults multiple organizations on youth agribusiness development projects and she also runs her own start-up social enterprise which focuses on improving women’s employment in impoverished areas in East Africa.
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List of Acronyms
CBO – Community-based Organization CRS – Catholic Relief Services DFAP – Development Food Assistance Program DFSA – Development Food Security Activity ELRP – Enhancing Livelihoods & Resilience Program FGD – Focus Group Discussion GoE – Government of Ethiopia HCS – Hararghe Catholic Secretariat INGO – International Non-Governmental Organization IP – Implementing Partner LRO - Livelihoods for Resilience-Oromia Program MCS – Meki Catholic Secretariat MFI – Microfinance Institution NGO – Non-governmental Organization PIM – Programme Implementation Manual PSNP – Productive Safety Net Programme SACCO – Savings & Credit Cooperative SME – Small & Medium-size Enterprise STD – Sexually Transmitted Disease ToT – Training of Trainers VSLA – Village Savings and Loans Association
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Background The ILO, in their Global Employment Trends Report, found that Global Youth unemployment rests at about 13.1 percent and it is predicted that youth unemployment rates will remain stable in sub-Saharan Africa into 2018. When young women and men are able to access employment, there is still a challenge in the quality of employment and their income level, as in developing countries 16.7% are still earning under $2 a day.1
Ethiopia, with the second largest population in Africa, has experienced rapid population growth over the last century from 18.1 million in 1950 to now 105.2 million people in 20172. This growth has potentially contributed to periodic food insecurity, particularly in rural areas, where young people lack opportunities to become productive members of society. While Ethiopia’s economy is growing rapidly, economic growth is happening mostly in urban areas and is not benefiting young people sufficiently enough. The Ethiopian government tried to address youth unemployment in 2005 through the roll-out of the Protective Safety Net Program (PSNP), which was also aimed at supporting socio-economic recovery in areas that suffer repeated droughts and other environmental challenges. The PSNP is now in its fourth phase, with the PSNP IV starting in 2015, and it is offering increasingly holistic ways for improving community resilience.
This study was conducted by Mercy Corps as part of youth livelihood improvement in “Development Food Security Activity” (DFSA) for Ethiopia. DFSA is a five-year program, which commenced in October 2016. This program intends to build resilience in populations vulnerable to chronic and repeated hunger crises and to reduce their future need for ongoing or emergency food assistance.
Assessment Overview This assessment provides findings from government offices, community members and implementing partners for the DFSA program. It provides an overview of the findings from both the information collected during field surveys, along with some secondary research. Analysis, conclusions and recommendations were provided for program interventions that could address the challenges of youth idleness and lack of productivity, through income generation and improvement of livelihood activities.
Objective To increase the understanding of the perceptions of the different stakeholders surrounding youth development to inform interventions to improve youth livelihoods that would be supported by different stakeholders.
Methodology The main substance of this report is made up of primary data collected through House-to-House surveys (H-to-H), Focus Groups Discussions (FGDs) individual stakeholder interviews all located in the project Areas. Secondary data, encompassing current events and historical documents, were used
1 International Labor Organization, Global Employment Trends for Youth 2017, Paths to a better working future. Geneva, 2017 2 World Population Review: Ethiopia Population 2017. http://worldpopulationreview.com/countries/ethiopia-population/
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as supporting information for the data collected from the stakeholders. The primary data was divided into three smaller individual reports, to showcase the perceptions of the local government officers at the woreda level / Government of Ethiopia (GoE), the perceptions of the Community in the three DFSA zones and the perceptions of the Implementing Partners (IP).
Key Findings • There are numerous activities that have been initiated by other actors from which DFSA can build on, mostly involving the formation of youth livelihood groups, savings activities and linking livelihood groups with micro-finance institutions. Overall, most of these activities, appear not to be coordinated. • Challenges to the success of these projects include but are not limited to lack of funding, lack of capacity to carry out activities, lack of investment in the area of youth livelihood development by stakeholders along with several social and environmental factors, such as population increase and climate change, which have led to a lack of livelihood appropriate resources, which could support young people to become independent and self-sufficient. • Despite that many more youth are educated today, most young people are unemployed due to lack of appropriate jobs that match education levels, which was found in both primary and secondary data. Or they are not taught skills that are marketable in the current job market, or they are not given the tools to create their own employment. Appropriate jobs for educated youth have not kept pace with increased access to education. • Many respondents from both the community, GoE and IP surveys agree that young people will best be productive when supported with resources to engage in small business, particularly related to various types of agricultural activities in crop production and animal husbandry, even despite some of the environmental concerns. • The conclusions in this study are limited to the areas that the research was conducted although it appears that there are many similarities across the country related to youth development as seen from the secondary research, which also confirmed youth idleness despite an increase in education and land ownership shortages for male youth, who are normally granted this land. This secondary data is found in sections 4.1 to 4.3.
Findings by stakeholder: Community Member Survey (H-to-H) • The Community felt that agriculture was the best sector for young people to get involved in to improve their income generating potential. They mainly consisted of these areas: grain farming, animal husbandry and vegetable production. They also felt that youth could be most productive when engaged in small business. • The community overwhelming agreed that youth are valuable and productive members of society for both men and women. • The number one challenge shared facing youth was the current situation of the job market. The second most urgent challenge was youth’s ability to access resources, which they could use to support their livelihood. • Almost half of the respondents said that the youth living in their household are non- contributing members and are dependent on their families. A significant number of respondents said that young people do contribute to household income, with this being most prominent in Arsi/West Arsi and East Hararghe Zone.
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• Despite seeing youth as productive members of society, the community feels that youth are dependent on their families. • The community feels that young people could improve their lives by being supported through life skills and overall skills training paired with better access-to-finance. They also felt that if youth have more access to jobs, they would be able to improve their livelihoods. • The community felt that male youth do have access to land, while female have less access to land, but that they have access to animals.
Focus Group Discussion Surveys (FGDs) • The respondents in the FGDs overwhelming found youth to be dependent on family support, they mainly attributed this to lack of job opportunities and lack of access to resources that would enable them to create their own livelihoods. • They felt that youth could become productive members of society by engaging in agricultural activities focusing on livestock (Sheep and goats), small poultry, cereal and vegetable production. They would also benefit from engaging in small enterprises and petty trade. • Many of the respondents in the FGDs said that the government supplied either no support for youth or that they provide limited support through organizing youth into savings groups or providing awareness on issues such as gender equality. • They shared that local CBOs are involved in supporting access to finance through providing access to loans and or credit. Many also acknowledged that they didn’t know about CBOs. They also shared they are not aware of many activities related to youth that are supported by NGOs.
Government • The Majority of offices had no projects related to youth. Some projects that offices engaged in specifically related to youth included, but are not limited to developing youth centers, organizing youth into groups, financial literacy training, engaging youth in work such as construction, HIV/AIDs awareness and then supporting the youth development fund. • The number one reason why government offices face challenges in supporting youth is that they do not have the budget to facilitate programs, second that they do not have the capacity to provide youth programming and thirdly that they do not have transport to facilitate activities. • The majority of government officers have the opinion that they play a positive role in youth development, while a small percentage said they play both a positive and negative role. • The majority of government officers have said that youth are valuable and productive members of society. • Government officers shared that youth become destructive members of society when they get involved in drug use, involve themselves in gangs and crime and that there are some that also have a hostile demeanor. • There were many opinions on the obstacles to harnessing the power of youth, which are a lack of resources to support youth to earn a livelihood, lack of access to credit, inadequate existing job opportunities, inadequate skills to be able to earn a living and youth are doing drugs and have a negative mindset. • Many government officers believe that climate change has negatively impacted youth’s ability to earn an income mainly because of drought and flooding, caused by erratic rain, due to its impact on crops.
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• The government respondents said that youth could be productive if they engaged in small enterprises, mainly agriculture and carpentry • The government officers overwhelmingly agreed that men have access to land, while women have access to animals. • A majority of government officers said that they are aware of the youth development fund, but that they are unaware of the details. • Government officers shared the opinion, that in the previous generation there was less access to education, while there was greater access to resources and therefore more income generating opportunities. They said that in this generation, the situation has been reversed.
Implementing Partners • Implementing partner staff shared that female youth were said to sometimes be more productive than males in rural areas due to income, work around the house and because they are not using drugs. But marriage is still seen as their main goal, rather than education. • The IP respondents found the main development challenges for youth are related to unemployment, attitudinal problems, nepotism & unfair hiring practices, lack of supportive government program and access to capital. • The IPs share that youth are dependent financially on their family members but that they are socially, politically and culturally independent • Some IP respondents share that youth are not given equal access or priority with adults in the community. Female youth particularly disadvantaged & early marriage a big obstacle. • The IP respondents felt that access to land, capital, and job opportunities are seen as being worse than in the past generations. • The IP respondents share that some govt. initiatives are seen as having an impact, such as improving access to finance. • The IP respondents have the opinion that NGOs & CBOs are seen as making lots of efforts but that they have limited resources and can’t address all youth issues. • The IPs feel that the role of INGOs is important because of resource mobilization, capacity- building and their role in dialoguing with youth.
Recommendations General Recommendations Overall, job creation is part of the advice from the community and it is important to understand how this job creation can be done in practice. From the data collected, it is not apparent that there are many existing businesses that can create new jobs and absorb many unemployed young people. Therefore, it is necessary for youth to be given the tools to be able to create their own jobs or engage in self-employment, with the aim of this turning into opportunities for these young people to also become job creators as their small enterprises grow. This can be done by utilizing a strategy, which involves a value chain approach as this approach focuses on systemic job creation, which has the potential to have a multiplier effect in creating many income generating opportunities. This approach has a few different components which include:
Component 1) Development of Enterprises along the Value Chain: Value chain development, when there are few existing enterprises can be approached by supporting the creation of anchor enterprises such as a value-added product (i.e. sesame oil, tomato paste, dried meat) or a valuable service (i.e. vegetable wholesaler, slaughterhouse, retail market). These anchor enterprises, work as
8 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment catalysts that create demand for many different enterprises to supply goods or services to create a final value-added product or service.
Component 2) Enabling Environment for Youth Enterprises: The stakeholders in this study, the Community, the GoE and the IPs, each have a different role to play in supporting the creation and functioning of these enterprises such as playing a coordinating role, supporting linkages, supporting an enabling environment and also using their expertise to engage in implementation mostly pertaining to the IP and the GoE.
Component 3) Capacity Building to Support Components 1 & 2: These actors will need capacity building in areas such as business development training and entrepreneurship. Once the specific sectors are selected, according to the most marketable products, appropriate technical trainings will be needed to support existing expertise of the stakeholders to ensure that the youth who engage in those sectors, will be equipped with all the necessary tools for trouble shooting their enterprises. The stakeholders mentioned in this report will need their capacity built to be able to properly support a better enabling environment.
Recommendations for DFSA 1. DFSA should focus on supporting an effort to lead and coordinate support for livelihood development across the different stakeholders from this report that are already involved in these activities and for those stakeholders also looking to play a role in these activities. 2. While the main sectors selected by the stakeholders in this survey revolve around crop production (i.e. grain and vegetable) and animal husbandry, DFSA should further select specific sectors for which youth can focus (i.e. mixed vegetable, goat, dairy), which can be built up more rapidly. This should be done through a rapid market analysis on selected enterprises, which are seen as favorable by young people. 3. DFSA can also work with the different stakeholders already participating on youth livelihood development work to coordinate these activities and build capacity of partners to carry out implementation to ensure they are executed effectively.
Specifically, DFSA should technically focus on: • Entrepreneurship & Business Skill Training:
Short-term The project should engage expert business skills trainers to carry out the initial rounds of entrepreneurship trainings for the youth and to organize ToTs for implementing partner staff.
Medium Term Housed within each implementing partner, business skills development units should be capacitated This could provide a framework for the capacity building trainings that are to take place with the partners. Staff could be organized to play different roles within these units making their areas of expertise more targeted and the DFSA could continue to support more skill building over the life span of the project to provide a depth of knowledge to the specialized officers. Technical skills training for the recommended enterprise sectors: This training is specifically to prepare technical expert trainers and coaches, to be able to support entrepreneurs within their particular enterprise sector. Youth that engage in the DFSA project will need to be equipped with thorough technical knowledge to run either their agricultural enterprise which requires tools and information on how to
9 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment troubleshoot when different challenges occur in their business or from their artisanal trade, which requires a specialized skillset.
Long Term After youth are trained and have started their businesses, there will be ongoing coaching, which will run the lifespan and of the project and hopefully beyond, as managed by the partner.
• Empowering and capacitating the implementing partners to align with government offices:
Short-Term As this is focused on capacity building, this effort is geared towards the beginning of the project, so that it can be utilized for project activities, however learning for team members should be constant and carried through the project. IPs need to work and coordinate with all GoE partners during their capacity building programme for the ToTs above and also during implementation. As the IP is going through the process of having their capacity built by DFSA in business skills and other technical areas, selected GoE officers should participate as part of their own capacity building process. See the recommendations in the GoE report related to the capacity building of GoE officers. It is advised to integrate their learning with that of the IP, especially the training of the extension officers and other officers that will engage in the implementation of the program. Basic technical issues will need to be addressed, mainly familiarizing them with PSNP-IV PIM, and other specific technical skills such as life skill, entrepreneurship, gender, and voluntarism.
• Engagement with government offices:
Short-Term The findings suggest that coordination of efforts by government related to youth development is weak and that they may have limited expertise in the required technical areas of youth-specific program implementation. DFSA should therefore focus on coordination and strengthening government technical capacity for the below named offices/departments. o Youth & Sport and Women and Child Welfare offices: These two offices should be worked with as part of the overall coordination. Especially the office of Women and Child Affair could provide support in ensuring that women’s role and their ability to be successful within the livelihood groups is enhanced by the program, rather than re-enforcing the existing traditional structure where women are being disadvantaged when it comes to accessing productive resources and creating wealth. o Cooperative Promotion Office, Trade and Market, Job creation: Natural resource and agriculture office, Livestock and Fishery Development office, Pastoral development office and TVETs: These offices are important for both the organization and the technical aspects of the livelihoods groups that the project will create. The cooperatives and promotion office should be the main focal point for the creation of the IGA groups. Currently this activity is scattered amongst different offices. However, this office should be the main support office to the IP during the implementation of this program. The other offices will provide support through allocating extension officers to be trained in the capacity building program stipulated above.
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1 INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background Enabling the socio-economic development of a nation’s youth is a critical factor in ensuring the prosperity and growth of a country. In many developing countries facing a youth population bulge, employment and livelihood creation is a growing challenge. This is also the case for Ethiopia, where many youth result to drug use and crime, leaving an unproductive class of people, which creates space for other types of volatile activities.
Ethiopia, with the second largest population in Africa, has experienced rapid population growth over the last century from 18.1 million in 1950 to now 105.2 million people in 20173. This growth has potentially contributed to periodic food insecurity, particularly in rural areas, where young people lack opportunities to become productive members of society. While Ethiopia’s economy is growing rapidly, economic growth is happening mostly in urban areas and is not benefiting young people sufficiently enough. The Ethiopian government tried to address youth unemployment in 2005 through the roll-out of the Protective Safety Net Program (PSNP), which was also aimed at supporting socio-economic recovery in areas that suffer repeated droughts and other environmental challenges. The PSNP is now in its fourth phase, with the PSNP IV starting in 2015, and it is offering increasingly holistic ways for improving community resilience.
Ethiopia aspires to be a lower middle-income country by 2025. Currently, 25% of Ethiopian youth ages 15-29 are underemployed and 71% of the population is under 30, with females accounting for about half of the population.4 Due to this demographic challenge, transforming youths into becoming productive members of society is critical to achieving the 2025 vision. When given the right opportunities and training, and when connected to the appropriate institutions and businesses, youth development can be a driver for creating a productive and energetic workforce and help transform the economy. Paired with the availability of resources such as education, access to capital, land and knowledge, youth development plays a key role in socio-economic development and transformation.
The USAID Food-for-Peace-funded Development Food Security Activity (DFSA) program, led by Catholic Relief Services, with Mercy Corps Ethiopia as an implementing partner, aims to develop entrepreneurial youth livelihoods groups as one approach for livelihood development. Entrepreneurship is a good tool for young people to become self-sufficient and pull themselves out of poverty while also enabling a livelihoods alternative that creates economic opportunities.5 It can also support a positive outlook for youth because entrepreneurship encourages people to have a vision and mission and a plan of how to get there. Youth can take their destiny into their own hands or have options for searching external employment when given the right support.
3 World Population Review: Ethiopia Population 2017. http://worldpopulationreview.com/countries/ethiopia-population/ 4 Ethiopia’s Key: Young People and the Demographic Dividend. PRB, Shelly Megquier and Kate Belohlav. December 2014 5 Celestine Katongole, Fiona Mulira & Wilber Manyisa Ahebwa; Comparative Assessment of Rural Youth Entrepreneurs in Uganda and Kenya
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1.2 Development Food Security Activity (DFSA) Mercy Corps is an implementing partner under Catholic Relief Services’ (CRS) Food-for-Peace- funded “Development Food Security Activity” (DFSA) for Ethiopia. The DFSA “Ethiopian Livelihoods and Resiliency Program” (ELRP) intends to improve food access and incomes through agriculture and other livelihoods initiatives; enhance natural resource and environmental management; combat under-nutrition, especially for children under two and pregnant and lactating women; and mitigate disaster impact through early warning and community preparedness activities. A five-year program commencing in October 2016, DFSA is intended to build resilience in populations vulnerable to chronic hunger and repeated hunger crises and to reduce their future need for ongoing or emergency food assistance. DFSA understands gender norms and power relations between males and females, and youth and adults, exist at the household, community and national level and through this study, the project would like to gain a better understanding of current stakeholder perceptions, which can then be integrated into its programs to make communities more food secure, improve their nutrition and ultimately be resilient to political, economic and environmental shocks.
DFSA is operating in Dire Dawa City Administration and eight woredas of Oromia Regional State – namely Babile, Midega Tola, Deder, and Melka Bello woredas in Eastern Hararghe Zone; Arsi Negele; Heben Arsi and Shala woredas in West Arsi Zone; and Zeway Dugda Woreda in Arsi Zone. And four target woredas of DFSA, Shala, Arsi Negele, Heben Arsi and Zeway Dugda, overlaps with the Feed the Future Ethiopia Livelihoods for Resilience – Oromia (LRO) operation areas.
1.3 Youth component under DFSA DFSA will promote more equitable decision-making while focusing on areas that directly impact resilience, nutrition and food security for women and youths. Incorporating learning from previous DFAP project and gender and youth assessments that will be conducted in the first year of the project, DFSA will create an enabling environment to promote gender- and youth-based equity of access to and control over community and household resources and to enhance women and youth’s leadership and participation in decision- and policy-making processes.
The project works towards the following objectives for youth ages (15-29), for both women and men, which will also support integration and engagement across all purposes: • Young women and men have increased access to and control of community and household resources (Cross-cutting Purpose/SP 1) • Rural young women and men have increased their ability to make meaningful decisions and choices for their lives (Intermediate Objective/IO 1.1) • Community systems and structures increased participation of women and youth in equitable decision-making (Intermediate Objective/IO 1.2) • Young adults are gainfully employed. (Intermediate Objective/IO 1.3)
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2 OBJECTIVES & METHODOLOGY OF ASSESSMENT
Purpose These assessments are conducted to understand the perceptions of the community, implementing partners (IPs) and Government of Ethiopia (GoE) at the woreda level on youth’s ability to be productive and contributing members of society and the capacity of institutions and organizations to improve livelihoods options for youth. The assessments also aim to understand the abilities and gaps of stakeholders in contributing to the development of young people. The assessment will ultimately help to inform interventions that enable youth to participate in their development in an equitable manner so they can positively contribute to their communities.
Study Topics This study comprises the following three topics which will inform DFSA’s development of needs- based interventions for supporting youth development in its project areas:
1. Assessment of community perceptions of youth equity, agency and empowerment, access to resources, and previous experience in youth development and engagement; 2. Assessment of Implementing Partners’ perceptions of youth equity, agency and empowerment, access to resources, and previous experience in youth development and engagement; 3. Assessment of the Woreda Government staffs’ perceptions of youth equity, agency and empowerment, access to resources, and previous experience in youth development and engagement.
Youth in the Ethiopian Context
The National Youth Policy of Ethiopia, which was written in 2004 defines youth as those persons between the ages of 15-29. The Ethiopian Youth policy sees youth as creative and productive and potentially playing a major role in all sectors of development. The policy speaks of youth as being vulnerable to falling into an abyss of desperation of their environment is not conducive for productivity. Therefore, they suggest to follow suite of other countries whom are giving special attention to youth issues and seeking mutual cooperation to address the challenges and needs of youth.
Definitions Productivity: Productivity is representative of youth engaging in income generating activities or other economic activities, while other youth that are not productive are idle and not contributing to the household. The project may want to determine a wage amount that can suffice to what can be determined as a “decent job”. Resources: Each time the term resource is used it generally applies to Land, animals, water, tools and any other resource that young people might be able to access as a supportive input to engage in livelihood activities. Generation: An average period of people living at the same time, generally considered to be about 30 years. Dependent / Dependency: This definition is based on economic circumstances. Youth are not able to support themselves and are living at home with their parents and are dependent up their parents or others for their sustenance.
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Youth Dedicated Personnel: Personnel within each government office, that has a particular focus on developing and implementing programs that support youth development. Legal: Made available by Law; permitted by law. Traditional: A customary practice that has been followed
These are the major terms used by the study and an explanation of how there were defined: • Equity: Youth’s ability to participate in leadership, decision making and access resources as it relates to elders in the community and then also looking at the difference in decision making and access between males and females. i.e.: The process of being fair to men and women, boys and girls that leads to equality—the equal valuing in society of both similarities and differences between men and women, boys and girls and the varying roles they play. • Agency: Youth’s ability to be independent, act for themselves and be the decisions makers with regards to their own rights and be the leaders in their own life direction and livelihood. • Empowerment: This was looked in terms of how the stakeholders around youth were supporting activities and an environment that improved the agency of youth or supporting their ability to make decisions, earn an income and be independent. • Access to Resources: Youth’s ability to acquire and utilize the necessary resources which they require to create income earning opportunities for themselves or to develop their livelihoods and financial independence from items such as Land, Tools, Animals, Water and other capital.
Learning Questions Overall Learning Question: What is the relationship between stakeholder perceptions, experiences on positive youth development and youth’s position in society? How can current capacities be upgraded to improve youth’s economic independence and position them to become contributing members in the community?
The relevance of these questions to DFSA is as follows: 1) The questions provide an opportunity to collect early project-phase information related to community perceptions and institutional capabilities 2) Analysis will inform interventions to improve the enabling environment for youth as it relates to equitable distribution of resources and youth agency in decision-making. 3) Analysis will inform development of interventions that will build the capacity of the stakeholders being assessed to improve the support environment for bettering youth’s productivity and contribution to being income earners. 4) The analysis will support the contextualization of youth development tools, including trainings packages, access-to-finance interventions and other material provision activates aimed at improving youth’s ability to participate in livelihood activities.
Study methodology The study comprised the collection and analysis of primary data. Some secondary data sources were used both for background and to help substantiate some of the primary data collected during the field surveys. Primary data was gathered through field visits to the selected woredas, where members of community, government and implementing partners were interviewed to gain an understanding of perceptions of youth. Each group of stakeholders was provided with survey questions utilizing different types of assessment tools from individual interviews to focus groups discussions. All interviews sought to probe stakeholders on opinions, perceptions of ongoing and proposed
14 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment activities, physical resources available to youth and actions related to both young men and women in their communities. Four categories of interview processes were utilized: 1) key informant individual qualitative and quantitative interviews with the government; 2) focus group discussions with the community (Elder groups and Women groups); 3) quantitative individual house-to-house interview surveys with community members and 4) in-depth implementing partner qualitative interviews.
Scope of the study The assessments for the three study areas were carried out in nine woredas in four administrative zones. Each zone had two focus group discussions, ten government offices were visited in each woreda, and 150 respondents were individually interviewed in each area. A breakdown of the interviews is outlined in the table below.
Table 1 - Breakdown of Interviews by Woreda and Zone
Zone/Area Woredas Government Community Community Office Focus Group Individual East Hararghe Zone, Babile, Deder, Melka 40 (10, 8, 11, 10) 8* (2,2,0,2) 150 (50, 51. 0, Oromia Region Belo, and Midega 50) Tola woredas (4 Woredas) Dire Dawa, Dire Dawa Dire Dawa 10 (11) 2* (7) 150 (150) Administration Arsi / West Arsi Zone, Zeway Dugda woreda 40 (10, 10, 9, 10) 8* (2,0,1,2) 150 (51, 0, 46, Oromia Region Heben Arsi, Shala, 50) and Arsi Negele woredas (4 Woredas) Total Interviews 90 (89) 18 (18) 450 (448)
Key informant interviews with various government offices were conducted, ten of which took place in each woreda. The government offices staffs interviewed were Cooperatives & Marketing, Pastoralist Development & Agriculture, Micro-finance & Small Business, Youth & Sport, Women and Child Welfare, Health, Education, Disaster Management and Emergency, Finance and Economic Development and Labor & Social Affairs.
Populations Size and Sample Procedure To obtain a statistically significant sample from the community, 448 (193 Females and 255 Males) non-youth (individuals over 29 years of age) community members were surveyed by going House- to-House (H-to-H) and seeking out random households. Generally, for any population size over 100,000, a sample of 384 individuals suffices to be considered statistically significant with an assumed p-value of 0.05, as per guidance by Krejcie & Morgan (1970)6. The sample size included woredas from both DFSA and LRO areas (see Figure 1 below). Due to logistical reasons, four woredas (Ziway Dugda, Heben Arsi, and Melka Bello) were left out of the community House-to- House survey altogether. However, the main challenges found in these woredas are similar in nature
6 Krejcie, Robert V. and Daryle Morgan; Determining Sample Size for Study Activities. Educational and Psychological Measurement. 1970.
15 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment and therefore the sample size could be considered representative of the perceptions of communities in these rural areas.
Figure 1 - Map showing the scope of the study and field visits
Data Collection Procedures Data collection took place over a period of three weeks in August 2017 after training the data collectors for one day. For the community house-to-house (H-to-H) questionnaires multiple-choice questions were used and these were administered by trained enumerators. Multiple choice questions were the method of survey in this instance because of the time it takes to interview 449 (193 Females and 255 Males) and also to have quantitative data. Also, multiple choice allows for the understanding the community’s perceptions of youth, and this information was captured by the questionnaires. However, due to the questions being purely multiple choice, some of the reasoning behind some of the response selections cannot be deduced just from the questionnaire because multiple choice does not provide much opportunity for explanation. Therefore, more substantive information was gathered through the focus group discussions (FGD), one of which was held each with community elders and women’s groups in each woreda, as they gave some similar answers to the community and they were given the opportunity to explain their choices in more detail.
Further information related to the perception of youth was provided by the key informant interviews from various government offices, ten of which took place in each woreda. The
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community FGD and community H-to-H provided a contrast in perception to the government interviews.
Limitations to the Study Not all of the ten government offices/departments were available for survey – not all in all woredas – and therefore the government data and feedback may not be representative of government as a whole.
3 BACKGROUND TO YOUTH SITUATION IN ETHIOPIA
3.1 Education Significant progress has been made in urban and rural areas with both primary and secondary education. Enrolment rates in primary schools rose from 61% in 1999 to 86% 2012 and in secondary schools rose from 13% in 1999 to 36% in 2012.7 However, while there are significant gains in education, the availability of jobs, also in relation to the type of education young people have acquired, has not grown nearly as much. It is therefore imperative for the Ethiopian economy to keep growing sufficiently to absorb the ever-increasing educated youths and creating the jobs that match their education levels.
3.2 Employment While there are many more educated youths in Ethiopia today, the labour market has not been able to absorb the number of graduates and therefore many youths remain unemployed. About 80% of the workforce is employed in agriculture, with 85% of households farming less than 2 hectares and with 30% of them farming less than 0.5 hectares, for subsistence only.8 Without the absorptive capacity of agriculture or the lack of sufficiently plenty job opportunities and improvements in the labour market, this has created a large number of un- and underemployed young people who either remain idle or engage in seasonal labour migration. This is exemplified in the estimated underemployment rate of 25% nationally where the labour market has not increased enough to provide new jobs.
3.3 Access to Land According to the Ethiopian constitution, every citizen has the right to access land without having to purchase it. All land is owned by the government which also retains control of access but in parts of the country land use by local farmers is under 20% of available land, thus allowing the government to lease land to foreign investors. A government survey found that nationwide 15 million hectares of arable land are currently under cultivation while another 15 million hectares are lying fallow. Of the fallow land, the government estimates that 3.6 million hectares are viable for commercial agriculture and has therefore opened up this land to potential private investors, mostly of foreign origin.9 While these investments often create land conflict and increase local grievances, they also provide
7 OECD, Key Issues Facing Youth in Ethiopia. http://www.oecd.org/dev/inclusivesocietiesanddevelopment/youth-issues-in- ethiopia.htm 8 Food and Agriculture Policy Decision Analysis (FAPDA). Country fact sheet on food and agriculture policy trends, Ethiopia. October 2014. 9 Bethlehem Lemma, Ethiopia: Government Provides over 2.3 million Hectares of Land for Investors. 2Merkato.com The biggest Ethiopian Business Portal. 14 May 2015. http://www.2merkato.com/news/alerts/3768-ethiopia-government-provides-over-23- million-hectares-of-land-for-investors
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opportunities for thousands of farmed-based jobs. However, these potential jobs will not be sufficient to make a dent in youth unemployment or to significantly reduce poverty because these farm companies tend to pay laborers only about 8 to 10 Birr per day, which is the equivalent to rough $0.34 to $0.43 per day.10 Updated data related to youth participation on privately owned larger farmers was not available.
4 ASSESSMENT FINDINGS
This section presents the findings from the stakeholder surveys and highlights the opinions and perceptions of respondents from the communities, government, and implementing partner surveys with regards to youth equity, access & empowerment, access to resources, and experience with youth development in the respective woredas (for a brief summary of these please see table 2 below). This data was gathered to understand the current situation related to youth economic empowerment, to explore the successes or weaknesses of current interventions, and to provide recommendations for a way forward. Community perceptions were captured particularly in relation to equity, agency, and empowerment.
Table 2 - Summary of main findings per stakeholder
Study area Community Implementing Partners Government Overall perception • Youth overly • More nuanced views • More upbeat about of youth situation dependent on family of youth and the youth development & development • Lacking access to particular challenges than community – needs resources, worse than for male & female youth development in previous youths seen as a priority area generations and it is • Female youth were & youth as productive even worse for said to sometimes be members in society women in terms of more productive than • Claim to be actively land. males in rural areas engaged in youth • Youth seen as being due to income, work development more prone to around the house and • Govt. assign more delinquency and because they are not success to youth unemployment than using drugs. But development previous generations marriage is still seen as initiatives than • Perceived community their main goal, rather community or IP preference is for than education. respondents agriculture-based • Urban youth seen as youth livelihoods more “unproductive” options but in rural areas considered more productive because the additional labor available in farming • Unemployment, attitudinal problems, nepotism & unfair
10 Xan Rice; Ethiopia – country of the silver sickle – offers land dirt cheap to farming giants. January 14th, 2010 https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/jan/15/ethiopia-sells-land-farming-giants
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hiring practices, lack of supportive government program, access to capital seen as main youth development challenges Equity • Male youth seen as • Youth are dependent • 2/3 of respondents having same equity as economically/ find youth dependent their elders financially but maybe & not empowered • Generational equity is socially, politically and • Youth seen has having undermined by the culturally independent equity when accessing lack of resources • Youth are not given services like health & • Land scarcity seen equal access or schooling also as being due to priority with adults in • Recognition of gender outside investors the community inequality less being given land • Female youth pronounced among • Women/female youth particularly govt. respondents culturally disadvantaged & early • However, it is clear disadvantaged and not marriage a big there are more male having land equity obstacle youth in power positions than there are female.
Agency & • Youth better educated • Greater opportunities • Lack of jobs, technical Empowerment today & support available to skills, and propensity • Over-reliance on youth than before but for crime/delinquency family youth need to take seen as biggest • Positive mind-set & advantage of them obstacles to youth working on behaviour • Lack of solid youth development change seen as development policies • Life skills important & framework seen as development & focus • Seasonal & outbound obstacle often mentioned as migration increasingly • Quality of education needing more a coping mechanism seen as a problem attention for youth • Youths not graduating • Youth groups & SME with the skills & development seen as education needed by priority area. the labor market • Govt. feeling that youth often consulted for projects for them Access to • Contradictory • Access to land, • Youth facing Resources community feedback capital, and job challenges with on access to resources opportunities seen as accessing resources with 50% saying it being worse than in • Respondents see key wasn’t a problem the past govt. role in providing • Resource access • Decent access to access to resources largely seen as being community resources • Skills development, beyond human in rural areas at least access to finance, and control, citing lack of
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land & cattle as • Some seeing increased TVET seen as key reasons government support / govt. inputs • Lack of savings programs as making • Males were seen as culture among youth up for worse access to having more access to seen as a problem resources Land, while females have more access to animals. Experience with • Little or no awareness • Some govt. initiatives • All surveyed youth of ongoing seen as having an government offices development government or impact, such as had youth programming NGO/CBO youth improving access to projects/initiatives at development work & finance some point in the past initiatives • NGOs & CBOs seen • Most projects not • Need for greater as making lots of coordinated and publicity and efforts but they have rather ad hoc community limited resources and • Some government engagement can’t address all youth offices not feeling issues responsible or • INGOs role mandated for youth important because of development resource mobilization, • Implementation capacity-building and capacity & technical trying to dialogue with knowledge appear to youth be limited. • Government offices were aware of the new Youth Fund. Only two offices were implementing it in their woreda, the rest is being utilized in urban areas.
Across all stakeholders it is a common view that young people are dependent on their parents and are not empowered to take care of or take responsibility for themselves. It expressed by all stakeholders that a major factor is limited access to resources. The community majorly saw that the government role and the role of other organization is limited in catering to youth development challenges, while the IPs sees the government as making an impact and the government sees themselves as playing a major role, while also having an impact. Implementing partners also share that NGOs and CBOs are trying to put forward a lot of efforts but that they have limited resources, while INGOs have the opportunity to provide a lot of the missing resources such as funds and capacity building. This table shows that there is a great need for youth programming as they are seen to have limited access to opportunities that can change their situation and that the current efforts to impact their situation are not sufficient, but all current stakeholders.
4.1 Community Perception of Youth Equity, Agency, Empowerment & Development The overall perception of youth development challenges in the surveyed communities was that they are dependent mainly on their parents because they have limited access to resources to create small businesses or access to jobs. Non-youth respondents also described how, when they were young,
20 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment issues with idleness and unemployment were not as pervasive. People were able to access resources such as land and farming inputs as there were more available. Overall, the lack of jobs and the lack of productive resources were seen as the main reasons amongst both males and females, while crime and drug use was seen as a secondary issue, which mainly consists of males.
Community members listed a few reasons for why they thought the situation was different today, including: 1) more people have access to primary and secondary education but formal jobs for such educated young people are insufficient in quantity; 2) population growth (more than quadrupling from 18 million in 1950 to over 105 million in 2017)11 has created a scarcity of land and resources; 3) climate change has degraded land and hit agricultural productivity; and 4) as a result, many young people are idle or resort to delinquencies. The biggest challenge community members said youth were facing was the lack of jobs, with crime and drug use associated with young people being unemployed and sitting idle.
Many community members participating in focus group discussions also saw young people as potentially destructive members of the community who may sit idle, use drugs, smoke, engage in crime, gamble and even marry without having adequate financial resources, subsequently divorcing. Only in Babile woreda did focus group members state that youth were not destructive members of society. Community feedback therefore matches with what secondary data on education and employment also shows, namely that the increasing youth bulge is not as easily absorbable in rural areas as in the past and that rural economies are not growing enough to offer youths enough opportunities. While community respondents stated that resources were more readily available in the past, the survey does not reveal why they think that is or if they are aware that land is scarcer and more environmentally challenged than in previous generations. Perhaps survey feedback also gives an indication that communities perceive that the carrying capacity of rural areas is being exhausted.
With regards to the most promising livelihoods options for youth, the house-to-house surveys showed that most of the respondents suggested that young people should engage in agricultural activities to improve their livelihoods (see figure 3). Some 42% of respondents thought that animal husbandry was the best rural livelihoods option, while 25% thought commercial grain farming should be supported, and 21% mentioning vegetable farming as having good livelihoods potential. However, most of the activities they suggested would require large amounts of productive land, particularly when looking at grain production.
11 World Population Review: Ethiopia Population 2017. http://worldpopulationreview.com/countries/ethiopia- population/
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Figure 2 - Community Perception of Youth Livelihood Skill Building Opportunities
Community Perception of Youth Livelihood Opportunities 1% 1% 2% 1%
3% 4% Commercial Grain Farming 25% Commercial Animal Husbandry Commercial Vegetable Farming
21% Mechanic Food processing Carpentry Tailor Manufacturing Small-scale Trade 42%
The FGDs also highlighted other ideas that community members had on how to empower youth, including providing them better access to finance or interest-free loans to stimulate growth of youth- run enterprises, business skills training for different income-generating opportunities, livelihoods group establishment for training in specific skills for such as livestock fattening, agriculture, poultry production, beekeeping, dairy processing, or vegetable production supported with small scale technology for irrigation. In Babile woreda, community members also recommended enabling factory job opportunities for youth, the provision of life skills training focusing on work ethics, or counselling to stop illegal cross-border migration in search of work. Finally, focus group members also suggested that the government could support these efforts by reallocating land intended for foreign or domestic investors to youth instead.
Some of the perceived livelihoods options are clearly within the scope and intention of the DFSA project and should therefore receive adequate attention and their potential and feasibility should be investigated further.
Equity With regards to equity, community respondents believe that young people, particularly male youth, have many of the same opportunities as elders did, at least according to both traditional and legal standards. However, community members also pointed out that the ability to access resources such as land and animals is greatly reduced, thus undermining generational equity. In the community focus group discussions (FGDs), there were multiple references to land being inaccessible and that young people were not able to acquire plots of land even though the Ethiopian constitution made provisions for this. Several elders in the focus groups also pointed out that land was increasingly
22 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment being allocated to private investors and that this was undermining land availability for young people. They suggested that government should reclaim some of the land and distribute it to young people.
Figure 3 -Community Perception of Young Women Having Equal Access to Land “No” meaning that Young women do not have access. Community Perceptions of Female Youth Access to Land
2% 12% 19% Yes No Sometimes Don't Know
67%
With regards to gender equity, for cultural reasons young women were perceived in not having the same privileges nor access to land resources as men, with the rationale that women will eventually move away from their families, so if they are given family land, that land would not be accessible to their family. While women are not allowed to own land, some are lent pieces of land on which they are able to farm or conduct other productive activities. Therefore, in terms of community resources, there is much less equity for young women.
Even though men traditionally have this right to access and own land, this is not able to occur, apparently due to both a shortage of land and population growth. Therefore, the equity issue between young men and women is something that the project could attempt to change at community level through community sensitization meetings. These meetings could be conducted at the outset of the project, during the introduction to the livelihood aspects of the project. It is encouraged that the project team facilitate a discussion with the community on traditional structures and practices which impact women’s independence and ability to own assets in the community. Community members could be asked to reflect on women’s access to resources and on how it is impacting the economic situation of their families. They should be encouraged to think outside the box, be shown examples of how some women are currently supporting their families financially and they should be supported to think about how better access to resources by women might contribute to improving the situation of families and communities. At the end of the discussion, there should be resolutions related to women’s access to resources moving forward, especially as it relates to the project as a starting point. If there is no agreement, the project could continue to have gender discussions with the community on a periodic basis alongside implementation. As the project engages women from the community, community members will begin to see the benefit to their ability to access and utilize resources from the project, which could potentially help to facilitate a
23 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment change in mindset. While mindset can potentially be changed by the project, it may not be able to impact the challenge of lack of land availability.
Meanwhile, secondary data study on the topic of land scarcity shows that the distribution of land to foreign investors is controversial. A report released by the Oakland Institute outlined how this distribution could cause food insecurity and have negative environmental impacts. They say that the investments in agribusiness are for flowers and food exports and that they are not contributing to improving local food security. This is juxtaposed to the 13 million people that are dependent on food aid, which can explain why the land deals appear to provoke controversy.12 Land distribution to private investors has taken place in Oromia, Benishangul-Gumuz, Somali and Gambella regions and has negatively impacted farmers, particularly the youth, as they are unable to access land similarly to their parents. Proclamation 455/2005 gives authority to the woreda to confiscate and expropriate land for the benefit of “public purpose and or investment.” Farmers have been expected to evacuate from their ancestral lands within 30 days according to Article 4 of the proclamation and if farmers do not comply with this, police are able to use force to make them leave their land13. However, equity related to land is an issue involving the federal government and is somewhat outside of the decision-making power of the local community.
Agency & Empowerment The community was asked if they found youth to be independent members of society. Independence was defined as having the ability to earn an income where they do not rely on family for their sustenance and where they can sustainably provide for themselves. When the community was asked about youth’s independence in the community, 62% of respondents said that youth were not independent enough, indicating that they are dependent on their families and not able to provide for themselves. As shown in figure 4, community respondents believed this to be caused by problems with the job market (17%(M)/31%(F)) and lack of access to productive resources (17%(M)/23%(F)).
At the same time, youth dependency was not seen to be caused by a lack of education because 62.1% of the community perceived that young people had greater access to education today than previous generations. This points to the fact that more youth are completing school than two decades ago. Secondary data demonstrates this trend very clearly, because enrolment rates in primary schools rose from 60.5% in 1999 to 85.9% in 2012 and secondary school enrolment rose from 13% in 1999 to 36% in 2012.14
12 Gellaw, Abebe. Think Tank Deplores Ethiopia Land Grab Deals December 1st 2011. /www.oaklandinstitute.org/think-tank- deplores-ethiopia-land-grab-deals 13 Umoya, Land grabbing and its dire consequences in Ethiopia, February 2014 14 OECD, Key Issues Facing Youth in Ethiopia. http://www.oecd.org/dev/inclusivesocietiesanddevelopment/youth-issues-in- ethiopia.htm
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Figure 4 - Community Perceptions on the main challenge facing male & female youth Most urgent Challenges Facing Most urgent Challenges Facing MALE youth FEMALE youth
Existing Job Market Existing Job Market
Politics Politics
17% 17% 23% Mindset Mindset 31% 12% 9% Education 7% Education 4% 21% 17% 2% Skills / Tehcnical Skills / Tehcnical 22% Skills Skills 4% 14% Crime / Drug Use Crime / Drug Use Resource Access Resource Access
Feedback from the FGDs also highlighted that many youths move back home after they finish school and that they rely on their parents for support. Once married, many young people rely on their parents to support their young family. Respondents also said that this reliance led to divorce in some cases as there were not enough resources to take care of a young family. This lack of independence was perceived to be widespread and that it had negative impact on the mental health of young people. Respondents in the FGDs also believed that this contributed to an increase in drug use. Having a positive outlook and mindset was regarded by respondents as an important factor in having a productive generation.
Furthermore, community feedback highlighted that less progress was perceived to be made in the creation of jobs that are appropriate for educated young people. In rural areas, most young people lack opportunities to enter the formal job market and they continue to rely on subsistence farming opportunities or seasonal labor migration. Youth also do not have much control over their destiny related to the types of jobs they can acquire and the types of businesses they can join. Jobs they may have been hoping for related to their education are not available in rural areas. Therefore, the only way that youth are able to look for jobs is to seek opportunities primarily in cities.
However as shown in figure 5 below, while the majority of respondents in focus groups claimed that the government did not do much to support the youth, 27% of surveyed community members said that youth were independent and self-sufficient due to government programs or interventions. This shows a divergence in views amongst the community at large and the FGD Respondents. The focus group respondents also felt that youth were not really involved in decision making when it came to policies that impact them. While many said they were not consulted at all, others said that they were consulted, but their ideas are not taken into consideration. While a majority of youth were seen as being dependent on family according to community perception at 24%, 27% of respondents found that youth were independent enough and 28% saw government as playing a key role in their
25 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment gaining independence. That said, 38% of community respondents also attributed the independence of youth to being influenced by their home upbringing.
Figure 5a – Community Members that see youth as Independent Community View Youth as Independent
1% 2%
8%
Disagree Agree 27% Strongly Disagree Don't Know 62% Strongly Agree
Finally, from the FGDs it also becomes apparent that seasonal migration to other parts of Ethiopia or international outbound migration was common practice and a coping mechanism when young people are unable to find jobs. During the FGDs, elders reported that migration had more of a negative impact on the community in terms of economic development. Respondents also noted that young people migrate illegally and that it was dangerous and often leading to challenges which required parents to send money to bring them home.
Access to Resources According to the community data collected, youth were found to be lacking access to resources not because they were youth but because the availability of resources did not exist. Some factors that were mentioned were found not to be within the control of the government, local community or the DFSA activity, and there were other factors that could be seen as part of a change in culture. These are discussed below:
Issues out of human control: When questioned about the differences between the current situation of youth and the situation of youth in previous generations, FGD respondents said there was a greater availability of land due to there being fewer young people and that they were able to access this from their parents. The other major resource that was limited is cattle. The respondents in the FGDs mentioned that previously there were more heads of livestock and today there were fewer animals to support youth animal husbandry. However, secondary data from Ethiopian government statistics showed that Ethiopia has one of the largest livestock populations in Africa with 50 million heads of cattle and 50 million goats and sheep. 15. It is not clear why community perception was that there were not enough cattle to support youth animal husbandry enterprises. Also, the distribution of animals related to the surveyed woredas was not able to be determined by both primary and secondary data. But it is clear that, the distribution of animals is different across woredas as some
15 Ethiopian Livestock-Ethiopia Country Commercial Guide, Export.gov. 6/21/2017
26 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment woredas stated that their area is good for animal husbandry, while other woredas stated that their land is good for crop production.
Climate change was another major issue which the community perceived to contribute to land scarcity and the difficulty in the creating job related to agriculture. Community members said that the soil had become drier and rockier and that there had been a drought for the last few years, which created significant challenges for farming as a means of income generation. Secondary data showed that rain patterns have been more irregular and many parts of the country declining since 199716. Community respondents also perceived the decline in rainfall being exacerbated by tree-cutting for charcoal production, which many people engage in to earn an income.
Issues within human control: With regards to controllable issues, FGD members felt that earlier generations had a better culture of savings which youth did not have today. Their perception was also that many of today’s youth grew up going to school and receiving money from their parents to support their needs and they were used to a more comfortable life than young people in previous generations. There is also a perception that even if some youth were able to access resources for some private agriculture enterprises, many youths would not be interested because youth might feel that they needed to access jobs related to what they studied in school.
Figure 6 - Community perception on youth’s ability to access the resources needed for livelihoods
Community Perception of Youth Access to Resources 1% 4% 2%
Disagree
43% Agree Don't Know Strongly Agree 50% Strongly Disagree
The community perception of youth’s access to resources is therefore split. For example, in Arsi Negele almost every respondent felt that youth were unable to access resources, while in Babile, almost all respondents agreed that they were able to access the right resources.
Experience with youth development programs With regards to experiencing or witnessing youth development initiatives or programs in their communities, respondents felt that there were few activities occurring in rural communities that contributed towards this goal. In most woredas, institutions with mandates to support youth
16 Oxfam. Rain Poverty Climate and Vulnerability in Ethiopia
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livelihoods such as local government offices, local community-based organizations (CBOs), and other associations were felt not to be active. However, there were some woredas, such as Dire Dawa and Midega Tola, where respondents named some activities by local CBOs, NGOs and the government.
While in some woredas CBOs are thought to be completely inactive in working on youth-related issues, in Shala, Zeway Dugda, Midega Tola, Babile and Deder woredas, CBOs apparently work with youth by starting groups to improve their livelihoods. Such youth livelihood groups are meant to encourage youth to participate in savings activities and access to finance. Some youth have apparently even created their own youth groups afterwards.
In most woredas, according to community perception, there are little or no activities being implemented by NGOs to work directly on youth economic empowerment. NGOs are most active in supporting youth in Dire Dawa and have engaged in counselling young people who are planning on migrating to other risk prone countries for new opportunities and encouraging them to stay in their home communities. As mentioned above by focus group members, many cases of migration abroad have led to kidnappings and ransom payments. Therefore, it is a perception of the community that migration abroad has a negative impact for the families of young people that decide to migrate for economic opportunities. Some NGOs have formed livelihood groups and enabled young people to access finance through group credit. Some NGOs have also provided trainings to groups in life and technical skills. They have also had awareness activities on family planning and STD Prevention. In Midega Tola, the NGO ZOA, has provided young people with the opportunity to start enterprises in poultry farming.
With regards to government initiatives, in most woredas focus group respondents said that government had a policy to support youth but that this policy was not implemented and overall activities had not been initiated to empower youth. Focus groups noted that some government bodies registered unemployed youth with the impression of following up, but that activities were not undertaken. Some government bodies also held meetings to consult with youth on their challenges and livelihoods preferences, but that there was little or no follow-up. Some government institutions initiated the formation of youth groups, but then did little with them. Some people claimed that that government had some financing opportunities for youth, but that nothing was really happening with these funds. That said, in Babile focus groups reported that the government gave away some agricultural equipment such as a water pump and improved seeds.
Despite the considerable resources by the Ethiopian government and international actors being made available for youth development it is clear that community perceptions contradict efforts and that more publicity and awareness-raising needs to be done by the various actors working on youth, albeit by not raising unrealistic expectations.
4.2 Implementing Partners Perception of Youth Equity, Agency, Empowerment & Development Feedback from two local implementing partners (IP) – MCS & HCS – and their staff was collected in six woredas in the form of key informant interviews. The overall perception of youth and their development challenges and opportunities were more nuanced than that of the community or government respondents. This was particularly the case for the different challenges that male and female youths are facing where IP respondents were able to differentiate better between how male
28 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment and female youth faced different obstacles. IP respondents also had a more utilitarian attitude and clearly saw youth as productive members of society that could benefit the country’s development if properly educated and resourced with job opportunities.
Especially male youth were viewed from two angles where most male youth were productive because they could provide a fresh and energetic workforce both at rural and urban levels but un- productive when they resorted to chewing chat, drinking or using drugs. Some respondents also felt that the question of unproductivity did not arise in rural areas because youth there were still considered a valuable resource and much-needed labor to help their families and farming communities. Only in cities where many youths are idle and unemployed is there a problem with unproductive youth that needs to be dealt with. Being a female youth is seen as having more challenges because young women are fully dependent on their family, particularly on rural areas, and they are not being treated equally with male youth. Many are therefore far less productive or seen as having less potential than their male counterparts. Based on the IP respondents’ feedback, it is apparent that CBOs and NGOs play a key role in community-based youth development as they cover more ground and because they are better resourced than communities or government. It will be important that NGO implemented youth initiatives be carefully coordinated with government and aligned to any national or regional policy. IP staff also seem to have a more differentiated view of the challenges, meaning that NGOs should be able to devise more gender- or context-specific interventions.
Equity IP staff saw youths in general as being economically and financially dependent on their families but socially, politically and culturally they were more independent than believed and certainly more than previous generations. That said, because of their status in society and their age, youth were not given equal access to resources or priority as adults in the community, although access to water, health, and schooling was seen as unimpeded when these services were available. This situational assessment, then, differs quite a bit from what community respondents stated where particularly male youth were seen as being equal to their elders in terms of access to land and opportunities. Also, contextually youth are seen as being dependent because unemployment had skyrocketed, even though efforts were being made by community, government, and NGO actors to curb the situation. However, the demand for jobs was not keeping up with the amount of un- or underemployed youth. With regards to access to community resources such as land or animals, IP respondents felt that the situation had not changed much and that local tradition still allowed male youth to access to these resources compared with previous generation. In their explanation to this question, they shared that female youth are seen as not having equal access to resources, particularly land and animals, because female youth moving out of the traditional concept of family membership when they get married. While fathers often distribute property to their sons when they become mature, female youth are not given land or animals when they marry.
Meanwhile, women/female youth were perceived to face particularly difficult odds when trying to establish a livelihoods or access opportunities for themselves. Not only were women able to access fewer types of jobs because there was a preference for male employees or because women were seen as viable only for a narrow range of professions, but they were also seen as lacking more confidence or feeling empowered when entering the job market. Finally, the lack of access to community resources such as land and the issue of early marriage in many rural areas also disadvantages female youths more severely than men. The inequality that female youth are facing will need to be considered by the DFSA project and special attention will need to be given to the issues and
29 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment challenges faced by female youth. Agency & Empowerment With regards to agency and empowerment, several IP respondents stated that youth generally had more opportunities than previous generations and that youth just needed better guidance to take full advantage of today’s opportunities. Respondents contrasted this with their own experiences when there were no special job creation programs or initiatives employing youth in public works, like cobble stone construction or road rehabilitation. Also, previously there were fewer financial services providers that can give youth credit services, limited access to education, and no TVETs for technical trainings.
IP respondents all mentioned that the main challenges for youth were unemployment and the lack of employment opportunities. However, attitudinal problems were also seen as a big problem because youths did not seem as ambitious or motivated as previous generations and that were more dependent on families for support. A lack of recreational options for youth and widespread perceived boredom were thought to be adding to the problem of idleness and unproductivity. At the same time, nepotism and unfair hiring practices presented almost insurmountable obstacles to many youths when trying to access job opportunities. Finally, many respondents felt that government programs and initiatives – while increasing and being better resourced than before – were not yet having much impact. Youth motivated to start their own businesses faced the ubiquitous problem of access to capital and productive resources, which was mentioned almost universally by all respondents.
In terms of opportunities for social development, some IP respondents felt that youth needed to be consulted more for projects and initiatives launched by government and NGO actors and that they needed to have greater formal representation in society. Educational initiatives were seen as being most important and impactful for youth development and great emphasis should be placed on TVET education and business and life skills.
With regards to concrete livelihoods opportunities that should be supported, respondents mentioned many of the same options that community members also cited – i.e. animal husbandry, shoat fattening, beekeeping, fruit production, irrigation-fed farming, etc. Encouraging the formation of youth livelihoods groups were seen as the best way to empower youth to be responsible for their own affairs, but it’s unclear if IP respondents thought that this was true for all youths universally. Rural youth were thought to become the most productive when they were organized into different business activities and if small enterprises operated as cooperatives, particularly with regards to small micro irrigation and agriculture business. Urban livelihoods that were seen to have potential were construction, various related trades such as carpentry and masonry, petty trading and mechanics.
Judging from IP staffs’ feedback youths would need better guidance and more encouragement to access the livelihoods opportunities that increasingly exist. The livelihoods options very much run the gamut of the traditional focus areas for youth livelihoods and skills development, although many respondents also pointed to the need for coaching and developing life skills and the employability of youth. There is perhaps too much emphasis and importance given to self-employment and entrepreneurship through youth groups, whose viability and sustainability is questionable, but it’s clear that youth livelihoods are thought to be an increasingly important development area.
Access to resources With regards to access to resources such as land, as mentioned above, most IP respondents stated
30 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment that youth could only access land when their father or the owner died and when this was inherited. Nevertheless, 37% of respondents felt that land was an accessible resource for youth and 20% mentioned animals as the second most readily available resource (see figure 7 below). In some cases, male youth might be given a piece of land to work with by one of their relatives but female youth did not have the same access to resources because when they marry, they are seen as moving outside of the family circle. However, other respondents contradicted this view by saying that land access was legally enshrined for youth, possibly in reference to the Ethiopian constitution and the stated right to land with government retaining ownership of all land, although in practice that proved difficult because land becomes ever scarcer. At the same time, some IP respondents stated that they did not know any rulings or legal policies that gave youth the access to community resources.
Figure 7 – Implementing Partner Perceptions of Youth Access to Resources Implementing Partner Perceptions of Youth Access to Resources
3% Land 14% Animals 37% 12% Tools Water
14% Health 20% None
With regards to accessing other productive resources, such as education, skills, or finance, IP respondents were less forthcoming with a detailed situational analysis, other than identifying this as a major hindrance for youth to develop and empower themselves into becoming productive members of society. However, some respondents felt that government initiatives and support where now making inroads and that access to finance especially was improving.
Experience with youth development programming Respondents differed on their feedback or experience with regards to NGO or government projects in youth development, with some feeling that little was being done while others said that quite a number of local NGOs were engaged in youth livelihoods and empowerment. Many respondents also felt that government policy and projects were starting to have an impact, particularly with regards to equipping youth groups with productive inputs and enabling access to finance (see figure 8 below).
Government strong points that were mentioned were inviting NGOs and other stakeholders to work on youth issues and establishing the government “revolving fund” (i.e. Youth Development
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Fund) as well as special youth capacity-building programs. This fund has been implemented in Melka Belo, where the Office for Microfinance and Small Business was given 11 million Birr by the central government, where they have given out 2 million Birr thus for are urban and rural agriculture projects. Also, the government was perceived as playing an important role in formulating youth development policies and increasing access to education for youth. Increasingly there were thought to be nationwide initiatives on improving the youth situation that were financially well-resourced that needed to be reckoned with. These were the government’s attempt to create jobs for the youth or to bring youth into entrepreneurship.
Figure 7 – Implementing Partner Awareness of Government Youth Fund
IP Familiarity with the New Government Youth Fund
25%
75%
Yes No
Meanwhile, local NGO & CBO efforts were regarded with a bit more scepticism with many respondents saying that NGOs were often too localized and their efforts disjointed. Local NGOs and CBOs were also seen as having limited resources and not being able to address youth issues comprehensively. More significantly, IP respondents felt that many local NGOs did not feel responsible or interested in youth development because this was seen as the purview of the government which has stated policies on youth development.
Local NGO and CBO project or interventions involving youth were also often thought to focus more narrowly on peace & conflict resolution or simple technical skills trainings. Less pessimism about the role of NGOs was attached to INGOs where IP respondents thought of them as important actors because of their financial resources and technical know-how and their ability to build capacity and dialogue with youth. However, even here respondents thought that more needed to be done and that most projects worked too narrowly on funds for trainings, TVET services, and small business start-ups for youth. One respondent ominously mentioned never having come across an INGO’s project in his woreda.
Observations on implementing partner capacity The local implementing partners stressed that they needed additional capacity-building when it comes to implementing youth development activities and that most staff members were academically well qualified but had little experience working with youth. Many staff also felt they needed additional training on business skills development and entrepreneurship or in managing
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access to finance interventions. While many local IP staff seem to have worked on micro-savings / micro-credit projects, they needed refresher trainings and more appropriately focused training on access to finance for small enterprises.
With regards to rural livelihoods and skills development, a good range of IP staff members had degrees in agriculture and/or rural development, it will be important to get expert agricultural and animal husbandry trainers to do the trainings with the youth, while the IP staff’s capacity is being built. Practical training and degrees in agriculture are much different and the practical side needs to be of good quality. The trainers also need to be assessed for their depth of knowledge on all aspects of farming, most importantly trouble shooting for diseases and pests. It is not enough for a trainer just to train how to begin the process such as spacing, timing of activities and how to plant.
4.3 Government Perception of Youth Equity, Agency, Empowerment & Development For this study, primary data was collected from six to ten government offices in each woreda in order to be able to understand the role of the local government in the development of youth. The offices most active in youth development are discussed more thoroughly here. However, not all offices were interviewed for each woreda because key informants were not available.
As expected, overall perceptions by the government respondents and offices were such that government was having a positive impact on youth development. All government offices also perceived youth as valuable members of society and that there should be active engagement from government’s side to improve the situation of youth. Almost all government officials claimed that drug use and sometimes crime prevented youth from being or becoming productive members of society.
Figure 8 – Woreda Offices who say they Provide Resources for Youth Development Woreda Offices that Provide Resources to Youth
4% Yes 27% No 51% Attempts made
18% In the plan
Secondary data related to government’s policies on youth development shows that the national government had publicly declared that it would involve youth in its development plans and in decision-making. A 10-billion Birr revolving fund for youth, which is aimed at supporting youth to start their own businesses, has been established. Ethiopia’s president has said that the youth would
33 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment participate in the administration of the fund.17 However, very little of this fund seems to have been allocated to the woredas for implementation so far. Despite the government’s announcement that 147,000 youth were benefiting from this fund in urban areas, youth surveyed in rural project areas had not seen funds being allocated to local governments or seen any benefit.18
Equity With regards to equity and gender equality most government key informants had little to say other than that basic services were equally accessible to youth just as other generations and that there was no specific government policy to enshrine youth equity. The same was true for equal access to community resources which most government respondents felt were equally accessible, though with female youth having greater access to animal and male youth slightly better access to land. Not one of the 89 government respondents noted any legal difference between male and female youth with regards to community resources. However, their view of the traditional customs is that there is a difference between males and females. 76 officials shared that traditionally, men have access to land, while only 23 officials said that women have access to land. They shared that women have access to some other resources such as tools and animals. Outside of both legal and traditional customs, the officials were asked to share their perception of the reality of gender equity in their woredas. Figure 9 below, shows the perception of the disparity in resource distribution between men and women is great, which is similarly backed by the opinions presented by community and IP respondent, who clearly highlighted gender disparities with regards to equity and community resources.
Figure 9 – Woreda Offices Perception of Youth (Male & Female) Access to Resources Woreda Offices Perception Woreda Offices of Male Access to Perception of Female Resources Access to Resources 80 40 35 70 35 74 60 30 24 50 25 40 20 16 30 15 11 20 10 10 5 2 8 4 2 0 0 Land Animals Health Tools Water Land Animals Health Tools Water
On gender issues and questions of equality government respondents were more broad-stroke in their feedback than community members or IP staff. Many respondents stated that the government viewed both male and female youth as equally valuable and potentially productive members of the
17 Gov't to Establish 10-Billion Birr Mobile Youth Fund. October 10, 2016 http://www.ena.gov.et/en/index.php/economy/item/2073-gov-t-to-establish-10-billion-birr-mobile-youth-fund 18 147,000 Ethiopian Youth Benefited from the Youth Revolving Fund. https://www.ezega.com/News/NewsDetails/4623/147-000-Ethiopian-Youth-Benefited-from-Revolving-Fund-Government
34 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment society. Some even felt that government provided special consideration to female youth because they were seen as more productive than male youth. As seen below in figure 9a, while there are more male youth in leadership positions, females in leadership positions at the woreda level are not far behind.
Figure 9a – Offices that have Youth (Male & Female) in leadership positions in their offices. Male Youth in GoE Female Youth in GoE Leadership Positions Leadership Positions 80 60 57 70 50 71 60 40 50 40 30 31 30 20 20 10 10 17 0 0 Yes No Yes No
Female youth were regarded by some as more responsible and good caretakers and that female youth were influenced by domestic activities at home. This feedback suggests that some government offices may be interested in the gender status-quo and reinforcing existing gender norms rather than ensuring equal opportunities for male and female youth.
Figure 10 – Woreda Offices Perception of Youth’s Roles in Society
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How the Woreda Offices Views Male Youth
Valuable members of the 1% Community 1% 25% Useful / Productive Members of the Community Neutral
Ineffective Members of the 73% Community Disrupters of the Community
How the Woreda Offices Views Female Youth
Valuable members of the Community 1% Useful / Productive Members of the 30% Community Neutral
Ineffective Members of the 69% Community Disrupters of the Community
Agency & Empowerment The main challenges for youth in becoming productive, empowered members of society were seen similarly as with community and IP respondents. The lack of job and access to employment information was regarded as the main obstacles, with the absence of capital to start a small business and the lack of skill or knowledge to do so were mentioned as the second most debilitating issue. Government respondents also felt that in most communities there was not a conducive market situation that would enable youth-initiated businesses to flourish. However, in addition to the job situation or weak local markets, many respondents also noted that youth graduated from universities or training programs with only shallow skills that the markets did not really need. Finally, it was felt by the GoE that the lack of self-confidence and poor personal responsibility or discipline were also seen as undermining today’s youth.
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With regards to youth participating in local community leadership and decision-making, most respondents felt that youth were given such opportunities, with some even saying that female youth occupied leadership roles in local government bodies or groupings. However, most noted that there was no specific government policy such as affirmative-action type policy to encourage youth participation or leadership at local levels. In most communities, it was felt that dynamic youth inserted themselves and naturally took on leadership roles. A majority of government respondents (49%) also confirmed that youth were regularly consulted with regards to local policies affecting their communities (see figure 11 below). However, when digging deeper the level of consultation appears to be rather perfunctory and ad hoc, with one government respondent saying that youth participation in local decision-making was insignificant. This suggests that youth empowerment is more of noble concept and that government is paying lip-service to this goal, whereas the reality is that youth and youth associations are rarely involved at a meaningful level.
Figure 11 – Woreda Offices that promote Youth input into New Policy Development Are Youth Consulted on New Government Policies?
26% Yes 49% No Sometimes 25%
Access to resources With regards to access to resources, the Office of Cooperatives and Marketing in particular mentioned that young people primarily needed land and that they recommended that government should distribute this resource to youth whenever possible. However, other government respondents claimed that youth did have access to land in most cases. As already mentioned, most government respondents felt that youth had equal access to community resources, though female youth had slightly greater access to animal and male youth slightly better access to land. In Dire Dawa, respondents even mentioned that youth had free access to forests so they could conduct beekeeping and animal husbandry activities. Only one government office in Deder noted that youth access to land was not universal. However, it’s clear that youth are dependent on community resources because access to other productive resources not readily available. Also, climate change
37 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment and other environmental factors were seen as worsening the availability of resources – particularly land and animals – that could benefit youth.
At the same time, most government respondents were keen to point out the resources and programs that the different offices and government initiatives made available to youth. Skills development, access to finance and TVET education were seen as the main three areas of support that government broadly provided (see figure 12 below). The various surveyed offices had different opinions on how youth were being resourced and supported by them but each office affirmed that support was given (see also section 4.3.4 below).
Figure 12 – Top three Resources Provided by the GoE Offices for Youth Development Top Three Resources Provided to Youth By the Woreda Offices
First Second
60 50 55 40 30 20 30 23 10 20 13 8 2 15 12 14 4 5 9 16 0
Experience with youth development programming As mentioned, primary data was collected from six government offices in each woreda in order to be able to understand the role of the local government in the development of youth. The offices most active in youth development are discussed more thoroughly here. With regards to experience and capacity with youth development programming by the various woreda offices, the following notes and analysis are helpful.
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Youth & Sport There were few projects run by the Youth and Sports offices for improving the economic situation of youth. Some projects were related to supporting youth centres, youth associations and youth groups. Out of the eight youth offices interviewed only in one woreda - Heben Arsi – was there a project specifically related to youth livelihoods, which focused on access to finance. However, no details were provided on how the project was implemented and if it had any results. Many of the office were aware of the new/upcoming nationwide Youth Development Fund, but they were not yet actively participating in its implementation. Seven out of eight youth offices said that they had no budget to implement programs for youth at all.
That said, seven out of eight youth offices showed they were not working on projects related to youth livelihoods and employment, six out of eight offices said that they offered youth some level of business skill training, youth employment programs and or access to finance. However, it is not clear how the government could have been able to provide these skills or services without implementing them through any particular project. So there may have been some error with how this question was asked by the enumerators, as it appears that these are services the government may want to provide for youth rather than what they are actually providing. Also, judging by the community FGD responses, it appears that the government is not providing much along the lines of these services.
The Youth & Sport offices also do not seem equipped to support any programs related to youth livelihoods development, micro-finance, nor entrepreneurship. It would be advisable to support these offices in increasing their capacity to provide some of these services and to support the coordination with the youth for project activities. While most offices stated that they had staff with skill sets in training and facilitation, being able to provide training on entrepreneurship and livelihood development are skills that would need further capacity-building through training-of- trainers or other modalities. Without some skill in training on entrepreneurship, the youth offices do not have the capacity to work with youth on small businesses nor help them to develop suitable business plans. Therefore, the DFSA project should work with implementing partners and/or sector experts to support youth in developing business plans.
Cooperatives & Marketing Office The Cooperatives and Marketing office’s respondents stated that they engaged with youth through several projects including on job creation, support for business development training, support to business internships and training for IGA groups. Like other offices, they highlighted as a challenge their ability to provide trainings on micro-finance, skills development, improving the enabling environment and general entrepreneurship management.
Another stated weakness involves TVET institutions which are said to be underequipped and only able to offer a narrow range of skills trainings. Some of the projects they have engaged in involve organizing youth into livelihoods groups and providing them with inputs or material, such as sand and stone for making bricks or animals for fattening. Respondents suggested aligning government activities with NGO activities related to life skills training and basic career counselling and to support programs that engage youth in community services and supporting youth business groups. This office also recommended that youth could best become independent by starting small enterprises, through various agricultural activities or small food processing. Some of the supportive activities that were mentioned that government could provide were providing access-to-finance and business skills training.
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Overall, while there appear to be capacity gaps in the ability of this office to deliver, they have the technical knowledge and the understanding of how to implement livelihood programs for young people. Also, five out of eight offices are doing or have done projects on savings and credit with youth. The project should take some more time to look at these different projects to better understand the quality of how the project is implemented and discern, whether they are practical to build on.
Micro-Finance & Small Business With regards to the Micro-Finance & Small Business offices, only one out of eight woreda offices stated that they currently had a running youth initiative. The office in Arsi Negele engaged in some trainings with youth in 2016 and 2017 where they gave youth training in finance. For 2018 they have plans to organize youth into youth groups to enable them to access finance. Meanwhile in Melka Belo they had a program from 2005 to 2009, which aimed at expanding youth’s access to finance through organizing rural and urban youth to engage in micro-enterprise. In Dire Dawa, the office tried to organize youth within the textile sector and in 2018 they plan to support youth through the revolving fund proposed by the federal government. So far, only one woreda, Melka Belo, has participated in the Youth Development Fund, despite it being a nation-wide initiative. However, the office also stated that the existing funds were not satisfying the existing demand and stressed that government should look at growing the fund further.
Pastoral Development & Agriculture According to respondents, about half of the woreda offices in this department are engaging in programs related to youth development, particularly focussing on youth livelihoods, economic development and access to finance. This office has delivered many technical services, including training on livestock fattening, water and soil conservation, crop production and other areas of agriculture.
Finance & Economy There are some activities in this department related to youth development, particularly in Arsi Negele in terms of microfinance and in Babile in terms of youth employment. However, some offices of Finance & Economy in other woredas said that it was not their role to take care of youth projects and that their role was to administer funds on behalf of the government. Though some offices did work on conditioning youth through basic coaching, they believed that they had best supported youth through the creations of small youth enterprise and enabling access to finance for small businesses while also playing a supportive role in creating an enabling environment.
Women & Child Affairs The Office of Women and Child Affairs apparently manages two programs working with female youth on empowerment, including the organizing of credit access to women-led youth groups. While engaging in only a few projects, this office stated that in five out of eight woredas they engaged with women on small enterprise trainings with some focus on savings and micro-finance. This office could therefore be beneficial when trying to organize and include young women in interventions.
Observations on government capacity The project should further examine the quality and progress of youth projects being implemented by the government offices. For most offices, there appears to be difference between what they plan to
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do and what to claim to have implemented. It is important to understand whether the plans are aspirational or concrete and which activities they actually conduct or continue to engage in.
Important will also be identifying areas of government capacity and areas where more capacity- building is needed. For example, all government offices interviewed had some level of understanding around youth development and the needed trainings and activities, but they need more capacity- building in order to be able to successfully transfer knowledge. A common theme related to challenges in fulfilling their mandates in youth development was that of budget availability. This contradicts many offices’ claims that they have implemented some projects related to youth such as micro-finance or skill development. Many of the offices also claimed that they had resources for micro-finance and only one office (The Microfinance and Small Businesses office in Melka Belo.) was actually receiving funds from the federal government’s Youth Fund. It seems their might be confusion between implementing community savings programs and administering a micro-finance fund.
Overall, most of the government interventions do not seem coordinated across woredas or across sectors and it seems that most efforts are initiated by individual offices. There are some offices that are engaged in a few activities related to youth employment, but they do not seem to be part of a larger overall strategy on youth development. Different offices, from different sectors are overlapping and implementing the same programs or say they are implementing the same programs. Working with the government to coordinate within sector offices across project woredas could support a coordinated effort to comprehensively build the capacity of youth to improve their livelihoods through the support of the government. More in-depth analysis for each office will need to be done for each woreda in the individual mini-reports.
4.4 OVERALL ANALYSIS Situation of youth The community FGDs especially provided an insightful view into both the situation of youth and what is happening among different actors tasking with youth development such as the government and NGOs. At the same time, IP feedback showed a more nuanced picture, particularly with regards to gender issues that DFSA will need to take into account. Issues with youth have been increasing over the last decade and were brought to the fore during the 2016 social protests, which are now encouraging different stakeholders to act more forcefully and implemented youth-specific interventions. However, such interventions appear to lack a comprehensive approach and coordination in order to have larger impact. A major role of the project should be to work with the government to develop a comprehensive plan which can be implemented across strategic sectors in the project areas. A sector-based strategy, where specific offices are focused on their area of specialization and are implementing a business support program in coordination with each other can support each woreda to engage and learn from each other in order to have an organized scalable plan. IT will be important to seek government buy in for this approach and ensure that all the respective woreda offices re ready to cooperate. Their capacity should be further built in their respective areas of specialization to be able to support effective implementation, alongside the implementing partners.
Job Creation Approach Most government offices noted that they were implementing job creation activities in terms of small business creation and supporting entrepreneurship trainings and access to finance. There was not
41 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment much discussion on other types of jobs creation, either through public works or public-private partnerships. Many government institutions and some CBOs have also had some experience in organizing youth into livelihood groups. However, it is not clear if this is an effective approach and if these youth groups are sustainable at all, yet in some of the study findings it has been noted that groups of young women have been more successful in collectively saving up and starting small enterprises. However, it was not clear whether these were small individual enterprises or group enterprises. It is also not clearly defined what livelihoods groups mean in relation to both savings and implementation of a business together. This needs to be clearly defined by the ELRP project and it is noted in the recommendations section below which activities youth should engage in together and which they could do independently.
While the government’s Youth Fund plans are promising, it appears that fund will first be made available and utilized in urban areas and that it will take some time to reach the DFSA woredas. However, since the need for savings has been stressed by different offices and by community respondents, it is advisable that DFSA makes investments promoting a culture of savings.
Stakeholder Capacity It is clear that the stakeholders assessed in this study need additional capacity or resources to effectively implement youth livelihoods programs. Skills in entrepreneurship training and development are lacking among all stakeholders, including government and implementing partners. Because the DFSA project has a business planning component, this lack of local capacity should be addressed. It is also important to be realistic about how much capacity can be built. One Training- of-Trainers (ToT) does not necessarily make a resource person a skilled business trainer, unless the ToT trainees already have a solid business background. It also seems that some of the persons working in these different institutions may not have the technical knowledge that is needed by future entrepreneurs and that this capacity would also need to be built.
It is also important to understand the partnering institutions’ level of knowledge related to the required training fields. From the qualitative data it becomes clear that the capacity of these actors may be too low to implement these programs without external trainers or external capacity-building. External expert trainers would therefore need to be brought in to facilitate youth trainings while also having government implementing officers and the relevant local implementing partner participate in each training in order to be able to effectively transfer skills to these entities. This is the recommended approach also for working towards long-term sustainability among the different actors that would be implementing livelihoods programs in the future.
Perceptions of Youth Livelihoods Opportunities In discussing potential opportunities for youth livelihoods the majority of community respondents mentioned primarily agricultural activities. This could be due to their more limited frame of reference and their own rural livelihoods backgrounds and experiences. More critical than the community perceptions could be the opinions and preferences that youth express, particularly when paired with a wider market assessment. The recommendations in this study will focus on agricultural enterprises as these were what were put forward by the stakeholders involved and they have also been deemed most appropriate by all the collected data surrounding the sectors, even with the challenges related to climate change and land and other resources scarcities. While some of the recommendations in section 7 below relate to the findings of this study, these recommendations
42 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment should be revised according to the opinions of youth and what is being demanded by the local labor market. A thorough market assessment is therefore indispensable.
Gender With regards to gender, female youth clearly have very different opportunities than male youth. Young women have much less control over their ability to invest and own land and or other assets. This creates a challenge for them to engaged in some agricultural activities or to have business that grow beyond small micro-enterprises. Community opinions on this topic were clear-cut, and 67% of respondents said that females did not have access to land equally (see figure 13 below).
Figure 13 - Community perceptions of young women’s ability to access land
Community Perceptions of Female Youth Access to Land
2% 12% 19% Yes No Sometimes Don't Know 67%
At the same time, communities do not support gender equity when it comes to decision-making around livelihoods options, life choices, and general empowerment. Figure 14 below shows this difference and few people strongly agreed that young women should participate in decision-making, which is a distinctly different view of male participation having strong agreement. While strong agreement verses agreement, may not seem like a huge different in terms, it definitely shows that there is less support for females to have a role in decision making than there is for male youth.
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Figure 14 - Community opinion on whether youth (women and men) should play a role in decision-making
Community Perception of Male Youth Community Perception of Female Youth Participation in the Community Decision Participation in the Community Decision Making Making
2% 3% 13% 14% 19% Strongly Agree Strongly Agree 3% 32% Agree Agree Don't Know 6% Don't Know Disagree Disagree Strongly Disagree Strongly Disagree
49% 59%
The DFSA project will therefore have to and identify livelihoods options that appeal to female youth and that would be sustainable considering women’s cultural and traditional barriers.
5 CONCLUSIONS
General trends Youth livelihood development is not supported adequately enough by the community, local NGOs, nor by government. Whether rightly or wrongly, youth are perceived to have more challenges in becoming productive members of their societies than their parents did. Over 80% of Ethiopians have been relying on agriculture as their main livelihoods and have been employed in agriculture- based activities. However, this is now decreasing as other sectors of the economy are growing faster and as youth are not able to find rural employments as easily as their parents did. This is due to a confluence of factors such growing land scarcity caused by rapid growth in population, policy changes or environmental factors. Improvements in education have also caused youth to be less prepared for manual work in terms of being willing to participate in this type of work, while the expectation for jobs suitable to their education have not increased sufficiently.
Education The promise of education has not kept up with reality as jobs are more scarce than the number of annual graduates. More youth than ever before are out of work when they graduate. Also, while access to education has increased significantly, many youths do not graduate with the skills needed for the changing job market or with the right skills to either start a business or find wage employment. To illustrate this, many government respondents’ noted that they work on TVET education, however that it is particularly inadequate and it is not supporting youth to be able to enter the job market. With a job market unable to absorb graduating youth, many youths return home to live with their parents and live off their parents’ resources. This then can lead to a negative outlook on life, delinquency in some cases and to migration to foreign lands.
Government Role and Perceptions
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The government has limited capacity to support youth livelihoods development both at zonal and woreda level, and the existing efforts are not coordinated enough, leading to a fragmented approach. Government departments have little to no budget to facilitate logistics and a lack the expertise to be able to implement quality programs that would enable young people to be able to develop their own livelihoods. Community perceptions on this topic, illustrated by the FGDs, is that there is not enough youth support coming from government in terms of supporting them with activities to improve their situation. The community perceptions were that most government attempts remained at the planning phase and lacked follow-up or follow-through. While government naturally takes a different view, they recognize that they are under-resourced but see themselves as playing a positive role in the lives of young people, likely through the meetings they hold with the community where they invite youth.
Community Perceptions The community generally does not blame youth for their lack of opportunities and views youth as energetic with the potential to be productive members of society. They acknowledge that external factors have contributed to a situation in which most youth are overly dependent on their families. Community members primarily recommend that idle youth should be supported to engage in agricultural activities to improve their livelihoods and that this needed to be supported by access to resources and to finance. Community members also suggested that government could be encouraged to allocate additional land to youth, perhaps by leasing out less to outside investors.
6 RECOMMENDATIONS
A number of programmatic recommendations are identified below. These recommendations are based on respondents’ feedback in this study, the identified gaps in current interventions, and existing opportunities that could be leveraged.
Shor-term Further planning is required to establish project interventions by the Implementing Partners:
• Step 1: All the intervention areas require a selection of activities based on this assessment and the other assessments occurring concurrently, which involve the perspective of youth and the market. • Step 2: An overall planning and strategy session, needs to occur with the local implementing partner to concretize the exact schedule of activities. • Step 3: Once the programmatic areas have been finalized, capacity building in each subject area for the different stakeholders (IPs and GoE) will begin. They will be heavy on the front end with trainings (ToTs), with more coaching and follow-up as time goes on.
Initially there will be ToTs in each skill building area, followed by trainings of project beneficiaries alongside validation of the ToTs, which is already built into some of the training procedures of the accredited business skills training curriculums suggested in section 6.6. If a new curriculum is developed by the project, a similar ToT process of validation with expert trainers should be followed. ToTs must be back stopped by expert technical coaches in their respective fields to make sure that by the end of the project that the ToTs are able to be the experts, and they will be able to continue passing along their skills once the project is over.
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Medium Term
After beneficiaries are trained there should be frequently scheduled follow-ups with them for back- stopping and also onsite learning and problem solving for entrepreneurs. This will be discussed further and explained in more detail in Section: 6.6.
6.1 General Recommendations These recommendations are related to the overall picture for improving the situation of youth livelihoods in the project locations. Young people struggle to find opportunities to sustain their livelihoods and take care of themselves independently. Job creation is part of the advice from the community and it is important to understand how this job creation can be done in practice. From the data collected, it is not apparent that there are many existing businesses that can create new jobs and absorb many unemployed young people. Therefore, it is necessary for youth to be given the tools to be able to create their own jobs or engage in self-employment, with the aim of this turning into opportunities for these young people to also become job creators as their small enterprises grow. This is best done utilizing a strategy, which involves a value chain approach paired with the appropriate technical training to improve skills to be able to manage and execute enterprises that are demanded by the chain that is created.
Value Chain Approach This can be done by utilizing a strategy, which involves a value chain approach as this approach focuses on systemic job creation, which has the potential to have a multiplier effect in creating many income generating opportunities. This approach has a few different components which include:
Component 1) Development of Enterprises along the Value Chain: Value chain development, when there are few existing enterprises can be approached by supporting the creation of anchor enterprises such as a value-added product (i.e. sesame oil, tomato paste, dried meat) or a valuable service (i.e. vegetable wholesaler, slaughterhouse, retail market). These anchor enterprises, work as catalysts that create demand for many different enterprises to supply goods or services to create a final value added product or service.
Component 2) Enabling Environment for Youth Enterprises: The stakeholders in this study, the Community, the GoE and the IPs, each have a different role to play in supporting the creation and functioning of these enterprises such as playing a coordinating role, supporting linkages, supporting an enabling environment and also using their expertise to engage in implementation mostly pertaining to the IP and the GoE.
Component 3) Capacity Building to Support Components 1 & 2: These actors will need capacity building in areas such as business development training and entrepreneurship. Once the specific sectors are selected, according to the most marketable products, appropriate technical trainings will be needed to support existing expertise of the stakeholders to ensure that the youth who engage in those sectors, will be equipped with all the necessary tools for trouble shooting their enterprises. The stakeholders mentioned in this report will need their capacity built to be able to properly support a better enabling environment.
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Utilizing a value chain approach will provide opportunities for youth to tap into systemically, as they will be able to fulfill different needs along the chain, from creating the demand to supplying inputs.19
Short Term Interventions or Interventions that occur in the early project stages: Stakeholder Support & Capacity Building The stakeholders in this study, each have a different role to play in supporting the creation and functioning of these enterprises such as playing a coordinating role, supporting linkages, supporting an enabling environment and also using their expertise to engage in implementation mostly pertaining to the IP and the GoE. These actors will need capacity building in areas such as business development training and entrepreneurship. Also, once the specific sectors are selected, according to the most marketable products, appropriate technical trainings will be needed to support existing expertise of the stakeholders to ensure the youth the will engage in those sectors, will be equipped with all the necessary tools for trouble shooting their enterprises.
Access to Capital Youth’s ability to access capital will be an imperative part of making job creation and livelihood development successful. A programme supporting youth livelihood development will need to provide solutions for building up capital amongst youth who are going to engage in starting a small enterprise. This can be done in multiple ways, either through savings programs, creating linkages to finance institutions or by partnering with other programmes that are working on enabling access to finance such as other organizations or government institutions that are developing finance funds such as the Youth Development Fund. This government fund is currently very limited in rural areas, but interventions implemented by the project should begin to prepare young people with skills and experience to access it in the future, through skills learned in savings programmes.
6.2 Recommendations specific to youth livelihoods programming
Medium Term Interventions or Interventions that occur after Capacity building trainings for the Stakeholders: Business, Employment & Life Skills Trainings for beneficiaries to increase business acumen for those youth interested in entrepreneurship and self-employment, to increase employability of those looking for wage employment, and overall life skills training. This is explained in more details below.
Cooperative Management These trainings should be done in together with the office for cooperatives and marketing. An external cooperatives training expert should be hired to carry out this training. Two of the most important goals of cooperatives is to have greater access to resources/inputs, in terms of affordability, and also to improve their ability to access markets, which is greater as a group than as individuals. This will be done through two main component trainings Collective Marketing Trainings and Access to Finance / Savings Trainings, where they will also learn to pool resources. Beyond the IGAs already selected by the government under the PSNP, it is not known that there are specific cooperatives for youth, it is more that there are youth participating in existing
19 USAID. 1.1 Overview of the Value Chain Approach; https://microlinks.org/good-practice-center/value-chain- wiki/overview-value-chain-approach
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cooperatives. This was explained by a few of the woreda cooperatives offices. These IGAs could be scouted for their potential to grow into a larger and more formal cooperative entity.
Collective Marketing Training: This training will be important to for young people to learn how to sell together collectively. Extension officers from the cooperative and marketing office should be present during the training and can even work with some of the trainers to administer the course.
Access to Finance / Savings Trainings: There are quite a few options for the project to enable access to finance. Village Savings and Loan Associations (VSLA), Savings & Credit cooperatives (SACCOs), partnerships with the government & local banks, or micro-finance institution linkages are some of the options that can be taken into considerations. It is recommended that the project start with VSLA groups and graduate into SACCOs. Beneficiaries will then be prepared to feed into local micro-finance institutions and potentially regular banks.
6.3 Livelihood Options
Medium Term Interventions or Interventions that occur after Capacity building trainings for the Stakeholders: Before finalizing livelihood sectors/industries, the DFSA project should do a rapid market assessment and consult both male and female youth on desired businesses they would like to undertake. The potential livelihoods options will also need to be looked at from a gender-sensitive perspective and options / approaches that are feasible for female youth need to be identified. The lack of resource availability in terms of land, animals and capital which is found in this study is addressed here through these interventions, where the project provides solutions that require smaller areas of land than traditional livelihood options. Some land is still required and the project will need to solve this woreda by woreda, according to the amount of available land, customary access to that land and or if the government is able to set aside some land for the youth to access for their livelihood activities.
Agriculture-based livelihood options & value chain possibilities From respondents’ feedback, it is clear that agriculture-based livelihoods such as animal husbandry, vegetable and poultry farming, or beekeeping are still seen as viable options. Therefore, agricultural activities are still recommended for young people to become productive members of society, utilizing different approaches that fit the local context. However, due to limited land availability and land degradation issues, the project should focus on livelihood activities that do not require a lot of land. It would be important to support alternative livelihoods and to help rural youths diversify their livelihoods options into non-farming opportunities. At the same time, not all youth will want to become self-employed or be entrepreneurs – and all wont’ be able to be successful at it - so there should be a focus on enhancing the employability of youths for wage employment and to include a job facilitation and placement component. The potential for supporting individual youths or youth groups in rural livelihoods such as animal husbandry, vegetable and poultry farming, grain farming, beekeeping, etc. should be investigated. This should include the carrying-capacity of land and long- term viability of such trades.
Specific Skills Training:
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The potential enterprises that youth may undertake should be very specific and tailored to the conditions that are located within their business operation areas and also which are particularly beneficial to the interests and livelihood goals of the youth. The trainers for these topics, should be experts in these particular areas. Some of these trainings, will need to be matched with access to finance/capital for the equipment and materials required to carry out some of the enterprises. See the process below:
Trained youth Trainings in Coaching in Enterprise IP staff ToT & on techinical Savings & Technical that can expert Trainer Skills Finance Challenges Troubleshoot
All livelihood activities should be suitable for both men and women. Some suggestions are: Animal fattening & Animal Trade This was a very popular livelihood opportunity stressed by both the government and the community. It is recommended that the program try training and capitalizing beneficiaries for rearing small ruminants such as goat or sheep. These animals require a smaller land area to breed and have a much shorter life cycle, so revenues can begin to be earned faster. They also require less feed than cattle, making them more affordable for a young person. Bee Keeping Bee Keeping was mentioned by some in the government as a business that youth could engage in. This is a good business for youth in the project areas as it does not require a lot of land and it is also a bit of an easier income activity in terms of time involved in care for the business. Bee keeping can also provide multiple income streams and job opportunities as young people can engage in manufacturing activities such as candles from the wax and cosmetics. Carpentry is also a part of this value-chain, as carpenters will need to manufacture the hives and therefore this mini-chain involves several different levels of job creation. Urban Farming Techniques for Vegetables in Rural Areas Since land in rural areas is scarce and many youth are unable to access land, they should engage in farming activities that also require little land. Urban agriculture techniques are particularly developed to grow a lot of food in a small area. This can also be used in rural areas where land is scarce. Examples of this, are commercial style vegetable sack farming. The key is organizing this in a way that it is commercial rather than a subsistence farm for the household. For example, a youth could have a small enterprise with a 40-sack vegetable farm, which can be started near the home growing a variety of mixed vegetables or specializing in a specific vegetable. It is key that farmers understand correct water and nutritional management for their plants to avoid diseases, which can be more common on commercial farms. Due to drought, small scale irrigation systems could be instituted such as the use of treadle pumps (depending on the water source and program budget) or a mechanical pump with a drip irrigation system. This could be done in partnership with a micro- finance institution through a leasing program. For cash needs, individual farmers could access cash through savings groups. It is not recommended that the project give seeds or other materials to do this as handouts. For items like seeds, entrepreneurs should take a loan from their IGA savings group and buy seeds or access finance from another entity. The project can recommend seeds or support the farmer in locating the best quality, but the project should not give them away. Farmers should also be trained in best practices for disease & pest management, as commercial production
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poses new challenges in this area, where it is less common for subsistence farming. It is also recommended to use ecological practices where possible, especially if bee keeping is introduced, chemical pesticide use can have a negative impact on bees. Poultry Poultry was recommended by several different government offices as a good income generating activity for youth. However, due to the skill level, knowledge and resources of most youth in local communities, poultry should mainly be restricted to either local varieties of poultry or the project could introduce kroliers / rainbow roosters, which are a bit faster growing than local chicken, but are also a hearty and a disease resistant variety. They do require some feed, but can also eat kitchen scraps and are not as fragile as broilers and layers, who depend on the availability of properly formulated feeds, are susceptible to disease and require a lot of capital. Non-agriculture livelihoods options Research the potential for supporting individual youths or youth groups in non-farming trades, such as construction, petty trading, repair & mechanics businesses, etc., perhaps in conjunction with technical/vocational skills training (see below). This needs a different market study as few details were given related to these avocations except that youth would benefit from engaging in masonry, carpentry and other building activities Long Term Training Infrastructure for Sustainability: Technical / vocational skills training related to the above technical areas A potential TVET intervention should only encompass the necessary technical trainings demanded by the above agricultural sector areas and non-agriculture livelihood activities that are deemed marketable. Based on a market assessment and potentially a labor market assessment, skills should be provided which are demanded by the businesses that are existing within the woredas and the business that will be created by the project. Most of the trainings discussed above could be carried out through TVET centres and this will therefore provide a long-term structure to house the trainings. This could be done with the support of the IPs, who will also have technical infrastructure in terms of staff competency to be able to provide support. The TVET centres could be the focal training location, while expertise is held at both the TVET and the IPs. The most proper facilitator for the expertise in technical areas, should be determined by the project team, based on further assessments of the existing TVETs and also the capacity of the IPs. 6.4 Recommendations for community engagement The project could engage the community by publicizing the interventions that will be implemented by DFSA. DFSA should encourage the local government to better publicize public initiatives for youth development and to increase awareness of the various government programs, all while encouraging community feedback and setting up a community response mechanism to feed into this project. Concretely, the main recommendations and steps here would be to: • Develop a communication & engagement strategy for community: Community based interventions should work on interlinking gender and youth specific activities such as, instilling positive behaviors to counteract destructive behaviors noted by the respondents through psychosocial counseling. Psychosocial counseling can support alleviating the major community based youth problem, through developing key youth and gender messages. These messages could be disseminated through different events such as food distribution or public works activities at the community level. Therefore, through counseling and sensitization, through the delivery of positive messages, it is expected that the youth in the community will regain their independence and self-reliance and will have a resilient future. • Support government publicity & awareness events • Set up community response & feedback mechanism
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6.5 Gender Specific Pre-Requisite Activities
As there were several differentiators between male and female youth, there should be activities that focus on resolving these differences. Some of these differences are related to the behaviors exhibited by males and females and other are related to cultural and community norms.
Male youth Behavior A behaviour noted by the respondents, which differ between young men and women, starts with the male behaviour of using drugs and also having a negative mind-set, caused by lack of hope due to lack of opportunity. As the DFSA plans to impact the lack of opportunity piece, it is important that it is paired with psycho social counselling and personal development opportunities to support changing the mind set of these young men to enable them to engage in productive activities. As noted, many are also looking for jobs that fit their education experience and also that appear to be more white collar in nature. Therefore, it will be important to support a positive association with self-employment through small business as a respectable vocation. Specific intervention includes: Group psychosocial counselling As psychosocial counselling, it is not a part of the DFSA program, it could be considered to support linkages with other projects currently working on these interventions, as youth facing these challenges will have a hard time engaging in the programme activities if their negative mental condition and their addictions are not attended to. Life-skills Training Package Personal Development Workshopping and Training should be carried out, to build Self-Efficacy and confidence. The youth mind set of acceptable employment could be worked on during this training. Young men should be encouraged to accept different types of business and self- employment activities as forms of respectable employment. In addition, the life skills training should help youth to explore their inner potential and capacities.
Female Youth Behavior For Female youth it will be important to engage the community and other stakeholders in planning livelihood activities. As many of the views related to women’s work are still very traditional in most woredas, it would be helpful to engage in community consultations to avoid challenges related to traditional community views and also to work on sensitization for women to be engaged in potentially non-traditional activities on a larger scale. In terms of trainings for youth and community leaders, it is recommended to bring positive female deviants or role models to share their experience of success. While many woredas did say that young women are the major income earners, engaging in both savings and small business, it is still clear that the majority of stakeholders are used to women engaging in work around the home. So the sensitization training should discuss involving young women in both small business and even larger business opportunities, which may require the ownership of more capital, such as land, which is still not conventionally allotted to them.
6.6 Recommendations for DFSA As mentioned in the general recommendation, it would be important to further build implementing partner capacity to implement youth development activities, to adopt new technical approaches. The different officers within the implementing partner should all be trained in entrepreneurship and then there should be specialized officers that can cater to different business and technical areas. The project can support this capacity building through developing a strategy to first assess current
51 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment skill level in specific technical areas and then prescribe trainings for the skills that need to be improved. The project should also ensure coordination of efforts at the woreda level. Specifically, implementing partners would benefit from Training-of-Trainers and coaching in the following two areas:
Creation of Entrepreneurship & Business Skill Training Ecosystem (Directly financed and implemented by the project) : Short-term The project should engage expert business skills trainers to carry out the initial rounds of entrepreneurship trainings for the youth and to organize ToTs for implementing partner staff.
Medium Term Housed within each implementing partner, business skills development units should be capacitated This could provide a framework for the capacity building trainings that are to take place with the partners. Staff could be organized to play different roles within these units making their areas of expertise more targeted and the DFSA could continue to support more skill building over the life span of the project to provide a depth of knowledge to the specialized officers. Technical skills training for the recommended enterprise sectors: This training is specifically to prepare technical expert trainers and coaches, to be able to support entrepreneurs within their particular enterprise sector. Youth that engage in the DFSA project will need to be equipped with thorough technical knowledge to run either their agricultural enterprise which requires tools and information on how to troubleshoot when different challenges occur in their business or from their artisanal trade, which requires a specialized skillset.
Long Term After youth are trained and have started their businesses, there will be ongoing coaching, which will run the lifespan and of the project and hopefully beyond, as managed by the partner.
Potential Staff Structure for Business Skills Trainers
Entrepreneurship & Business Trainers / Coaches specialized in marketing, finance, organizational and talent management (15 Business Trainers/Coaches) – These Business Skill Trainers /Coaches will be responsible for training all of the youth that enter into the DFSA programme in the basic entrepreneurship skills that will help them start their business. The project could choose a curriculum, such as the ILO Start Your Own Business curriculum or the IFC business edge training which is more advanced for highly educated youth, as base curriculums for all the youth that will undergo business skills trainings. The initial training for youth that will engage in business skills is 5 days, with additional trainings offered to build on what they learn in the basic course. This business skills training should occur quickly after the life skills training package has been delivered. These personnel would be built into a training programme which looked like schedule below.
Stages of Staff Development and Progression to Beneficiary Support: a. Staff engage in ToT for the selected Entrepreneurship curriculum. b. Staff provide in Trainings: Selected Business Skills Training course with youth IGA containing approximately 50 to 60 youth. This is a large number for a training, but it is still manageable inside of this basic curriculum.
52 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment c. Staff engage in Follow-up coaching scheduled sessions: There could be 9 of these scattered throughout the year. Initially once a month in the beginning and then once every other month thereafter. Young people would come together in groups to get group coaching, where others can learn from each other’s challenges. This should be mandatory for the first year.
Staff can also hold office hours for follow-up coaching sessions. This is when youth are struggling with a challenge on their business and they can either request a coach come to their site or can come to the IP office to work with a coach on their problem.
Creation of Technical skills training Ecosystem for the selected enterprise sectors: This training is specifically to prepare technical expert trainers and coaches, to be able to support entrepreneurs within their particular enterprise sector. Youth that engage in the DFSA project will need to be equipped with thorough technical knowledge to run either their agricultural enterprise which requires tools and information on how to troubleshoot when different challenges occur in their business or from their artisanal trade, which requires a specialized skillset.
Identify Staff within the IP, whom already have different areas of specialization. If the needed specialization does not exist, work with the IP to hire an external expert or to recruit the correct people. Further improve their skills by either bringing an expert to conduct trainings or by sending selected staff members for short courses
Potential Staff Structure for Technical Trainers:
There should be Technical Expert Trainers / Coaches specialized in the particular sectors the project chooses to focus on. As said above these trainers should acquire a deeper expertise in their field, which should be provided by the project through capacity building. If they are trained by external experts, these experts can be hired to also put together a full training package which they can then use for the youth they will train. If they are sent to an intensive agricultural or technical course, these IP officers will need to be tasked with developing modules to transfer their knowledge to the youth.
Stages of Staff Development and Progression to Beneficiary Support
a. Staff engage in a deepening of their knowledge either through external expert visiting the course or external course. b. Staff develop training programme for their technical area if there is not a solid existing curriculum to support their specialized area. c. Staff provide a Training series to build on the skills of the participants: For Agricultural Projects this can be done over the course of a season and for other technical skills, this can be done more intensively in a condensed training. d. These technical experts will then need to follow-up with site visits so that they will also be traveling from business to business to see how the entrepreneurs are preforming technically and to support them in trouble shooting technical areas of their business. These site visits are necessary, as they actually need to physically see what is going on in the business, to be able to understand their challenges.
The key point here is experts need to ensure that the trainings are thorough and are preparing trainers to be able to transfer knowledge that will enable beneficiary / entrepreneurs to be able to
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problem solve. If there is only a surface level training in a skill, there will potentially be an information gap, which may cause entrepreneurs to lack appropriate problem solving tools. For example, many technical trainings, organized by NGOs outside of an academic programme, miss some critical topics. Such as in agriculture, many trainings cover the growing process, but they do not cover pest and disease management. This knowledge can determine the success of a business. If a farmer does not understand how to tackle those challenges on the farm, then they are at risk of losing their harvest.
Empowering and capacitating the implementing partners to align with government offices
Short-Term As this is focused on capacity building, this effort is geared towards the beginning of the project, so that it can be utilized for project activities, however learning for team members should be constant and carried through the project. IPs need to work and coordinate with all GoE partners during their capacity building programme for the ToTs above and also during implementation. As the IP is going through the process of having their capacity built by DFSA in business skills and other technical areas, selected GoE officers should participate as part of their own capacity building process. See the recommendations in the GoE report related to the capacity building of GoE officers. It is advised to integrate their learning with that of the IP, especially the training of the extension officers and other officers that will engage in the implementation of the program. Basic technical issues will need to be addressed, mainly familiarizing them with PSNP-IV PIM, and other specific technical skills such as life skill, entrepreneurship, gender, and voluntarism.
6.7 Recommendations for government engagement The findings suggest that coordination of efforts by government related to youth development is weak and that they may have limited expertise in the required technical areas of youth-specific program implementation. DFSA should therefore focus on coordination and strengthening government technical capacity for the below named offices/departments. The youth interventions can be implemented alongside government, but the government should not be the main implementing actor for DFSA. Instead, they should be supported by the local partner who in turn is being back-stopped/supported by technical experts. The DFSA project should also try to avoid programmatic duplication, overlap, and interventions that lack coordination. Instead the project should encourage coordination across all government sectors both in planning and implementation of youth development programs:
Short Term The structural issues related to lack of funding is the largest constraint of the local GoE offices. The project has allocated funds under project Output 1.1.3.2 to be able to support the selected local government offices at the Woreda level to have sufficient resources throughout the project to be able to support facilitation related to administrative needs, IO 1.1.3 has funds allocated for supporting sufficient staffing needs and other budget lines support logistical program needs related to the different activities. Therefore, the resources will be provided for under the DFSA.
Long Term However, this creates a challenge for sustainability once the project ends. A large part of the program is for capacitating extension officers. Once these officers go through the capacity building
54 | P a g e DFSA, Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment training they will have invaluable skills for their youth constituents. If it could be worked into the government protocols, they could institute an affordable fee for young people to be able to acquire those skills, if they cannot access more resources from the current system. Particularly, some extension officers may not receive a sufficient salary or there may even be some unpaid officers. This could provide incentive for them to continue to transfer knowledge after the program has ended.
Youth & Sport and Women and Child Welfare offices These two offices should be worked with as part of the overall coordination. Especially the office of Women and Child Affair could provide support in ensuring that women’s role and their ability to be successful within the livelihood groups is enhanced by the program, rather than re-enforcing the existing traditional structure where women are being disadvantaged when it comes to accessing productive resources and creating wealth. Therefore, this office could support DFSA to develop and implement protocols, which could ensure a beneficial environment within the project, to improve the positions for females. Youth and Sport office at Woreda level are not fully powerful and not aware about the youth development fund. So they need to be coordinated and strengthened so as to functioning effectively. Also influence agenda as to be youth and sport office should get recognition.
Cooperative Promotion Office, Trade and Market, Job employment creation, Natural resource and agriculture office, Livestock and Fishery Development office, Pastoral development office and TVETs These offices are important for both the organization and the technical aspects of the livelihoods groups that the project will create. The cooperatives and promotion office should be the main focal point for the creation of the IGA groups. Currently this activity is scattered amongst different offices. However, this office should be the main support office to the IP during the implementation of this programme. The other offices will provide support through allocating extension officers to be trained in the capacity building programme stipulated above. These extension officers will work together with the IPs, to support the beneficiary IGA groups in having the technical knowledge they require for their business on an ongoing basis. While DFSA does not have a development fund per se, it can work with these departments to build awareness for a collective savings culture among the livelihoods group and then help to develop the SACCOs long-term.
Financial service providers such as MFIs, RUSACCOs In order to build towards incorporating DFSA beneficiaries into the Government’s plan for their Youth Development Fund, the project should work with youth and youth livelihoods groups to develop a savings culture and to shift them into savings cooperatives in the long-term. This should happen in conjunction with the financial service providers to ensure that the groups are following government rules and could later be incorporated as borrowers for the Youth Development Fund when it is being rolled out. This office could eventually facilitate linkages with other MFI institutions, which some have also shared that they have carried out in the past.
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ANNEX A: AGGREGATED DATA FROM COMMUNITY FGDs
15. What are the three most Urgent Challenges Facing Youth? Are they different for male and female youth? Male • No Access to resources • No Access to Finance • No jobs available and many youths migrate outside to find jobs • Addiction to Drugs (Caused by Idleness) • Lack of Diversified Farming Skills. • Climate Change • Mindset about jobs
Female • Women, lack of finance to engage in small businesses • Engaging in unwanted early Marriage • Almost had domestic work • Migration to Djibouti and Saudi-Arabia • Climate Change 16. How are the youth viewed by the community? DISCUSSION
• Currently male youth are not viewed as productive member of society as they are jobless and stay at home idle • Youth can be productive but they are not given the skills. • Male youth can be productive members of society as they have power, but they are not working and are jobless. • Young people (males are energetic) have power and are productive which is why we are a good country. • Youth are the power of the community, if the youth fail the community fails. 17. How does this view differ for young women? • Women are more productive than men (5) • Better savings culture (3) • Use resources more efficiently (4) • Women should just be married and immediately after education • Women (2) • Women less productive than men, engaged in reproductive activities (2) • Both are productive • Productive in small business • Contribute to crop production • They have power in the community • Obedient in working effectively 18. Do you see youth independent or dependent? (explain their behaviors here) • Youth are Dependent (14) • asset to finance (4) • Dependent Drug use / Chat chewing • No access to resources and seek money from their parents • Many youth do pass grade 10 but fail to get a job, due to no job availability (7) • Poor ability to engage in agriculture (2)
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• Lack mindset to work on construction • Many Migrate to different countries to find opportunities 19. If youth are independent, what makes them independent and what has given them the ability to be independent. • Female youth are sometimes independent as they engage themselves in income generating activities like petty trades to help their families. (2) • Some male youth are engaged in Machine operation, such as tractor driving • Those that migrate and find jobs elsewhere are independent • (All other answers just say they are dependent) 20. If youth are dependent, what makes them dependent and what is the cause of this behavior? • Lack of resources (13) • Lack of job opportunities (18) • Too much education (they don’t want to work at unrelated positions) • Lack of access to Land & Water (3) • Lack of access to finance (5) • Lack of access to job and skill development training for IGA (5) • In Deder Hakebas (no access to high school), families can’t afford to send youth to urban areas for school • Lack of family monitoring and shaping of youth • Lack of education / Early Marriage (female youth) (2) • Some youth get held hostage in foreign lands and family asked to pay • Drop out of school (2) • Bad attitude of youth • Lack of market access • Educated youth demand employment with government • Lack of youth enterprise groups 21. Where do you see youth potentially becoming the most productive members of society, in which sectors? • Livestock fattening (Sheep and goat Rearing) (12) • Livestock trade • Carpentry (3) • Petty Trade (4) • Cereal Trading • Cereal production • Participation in mechanized agriculture • Farming with irrigation (vegetable) (10) • Employed by government (92) • Dairy • Poultry production, esp. for women (6) • Charcoal production (2) • Construction of bricks • Seed collection • IGAs Groups • Bee keeping • Government Creates jobs for them • Financial support given to them • Skills training
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• Small enterprise • Credit Enterprise • Day labor / Construction • Working in factories • driver 22. Where do you see youth being or becoming destructive members of society? Try to be specific • Jobless & idle (needs to be favorable job environment) (6) • Chewing Chat & smoking (13) • Feel neglected by government • Crime & Conflict (2) • Gambling • Exposed to bad health condition • Early marriage without resources (leads to divorce) (4) • When engaged in activities they are not interested in • Illegal migration (2) • Babile (said they are not destructive) 23. When you were a youth, were youth productive members of society? What in the environment has changed to create the current situation? • Previously there were enough resources (excess productive land) (7) • If youth have access to job education, job opportunity is very difficult • No access to education / but livelihood was better (3) • opportunity is difficult • NO drugs previously (3) • Good savings Habit • Accessed resourced from parents, such as land (2) • Low family size • Too much education without employment (3) • High population / youth were few in number (3) • Everything was in harmony before • Used to cattle trade (sufficient animals which produced meat and milk) (5) • The climate has changed & Land has deteriorated / water scarcity (9) • Youth were employed without education / now educated youth are left unemployed (4) • Better Opportunities • Lack work culture • Youth don't have opportunities to create their own capital • The lives of youth were too comfortable / don’t want to engage in challenging life 24. What obstacles are there to “harnessing the power of the youth”? • Lack of Resources • Low agricultural production • Lack of enough financial resources (2) • Lack of rain • Lack of job opportunities (3) • Lack of local factories and other mechanical opportunities for youth. • In Babile, there is a large water table that could provide irrigation (rich in underground water) • Lack of capital, land /water and other inputs (3) • Lack of skill (for example construction) (2)
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• Dire Dawa, Lack of Education after Grade 8, only some parents are able to send their kids to Secondary School • Migration • High cost of living / poor economy (2) • Drug use (2) 25. How do you see those obstacles being overcome? • Create Access to Land (3) • Implement the youth support policy • Create job opportunities (4) • Access to finance / facilitate loans for youth (3) • Skill Development Training (2) • Take land from investors back and give to youth 26. In your opinion, how could youth best be supported to improve their position in the community? • Provision of life skill training (6) • Work ethic training • Irrigation systems • Loan activities – organize youth in groups • Quality education (3) • Counselling service (2) • Enabling hope so they do not become desperate and hopeless (2) • Engaging youth in activities and involving them in public discussions / Involving them in decision making (2) • Providing awareness about hazards of illegal migration • Creating of job opportunities • Income-Generating Activities (IGA) • Finance Training 27. In your opinion, how could youth best be supported to improve their livelihoods? • Access to finance / interest-free loans (11) • Facilitating market linkages for youth • Education appropriate for job market • IGA • Create jobs (5) • Skill training to do jobs (5) • Access to land • Access to resources • Enabling access to resources & diversified IGA • Providing essential business skills for different IGAs (3) • Establishing livelihood groups • Life skill training to improve working culture • Enroll youth in government works • Livestock trade • Youth group organizing their own IGA (3) • Controlling migration through counselling • Psychological counseling • Available job opportunities (small trade, ag, poultry production, dairy, honey)
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28. Traditionally, do youth have access to community resources? Is this honored today? How does this differ for young men and women? • Men have more access than women which causes women to leave household (6) • There is a culture of youth having access to livestock and land, from parents (11) • Male youth can inherit animals and land when their parents die (2) • No access (3) • Women are provided with cattle when they get married • Resources taken by elders. • Women can only use, but not own • Female have only when there are not male (2) 29. Legally, do youth have access to community resources? Is this honored today? How does this differ for young men and women? • No (13) • Yes (Both men and women have access to resources legally) (Dire Dawa) (Midega Tola) (Babile) (Deder) (4) 30. Does the government provide any support for youth? • Only promised, but no real support • No (5) • Awareness creation on gender equality • No and productive land has been occupied by a few investors • Only registering unemployed youth • There is a plan for support • They facilitate finance and loans • They are creating jobs • Sometimes invited to government meetings to see how to support them. • There is a little support • (Babile) Revolving fund (10 youth per kebele) to participate in IGA • Priority also given to women • One formed youth groups to access finance, but no finance yet provided (3) • One expert on youth is present in the office but does not meet their needs 31. Are youth able to seek leadership positions in local governing bodies? Are there any youth in leadership positions? • Most are literate, so they have the potential • Youth Seek to be leaders • Youth have interest, but there are no youth in leadership positions (4) • No (5) • Youth are able to seek positions in leaders (2) • Youth are seen in the kebele administration and on is the director of a school (Dire Dawa) • Some work as experts in government office (small number of university graduates • Sometimes youth seek positions, but there is no affirmative action by gov. • Youth also not interested • Sometimes, but mostly involved in community activities • No one in the community relies on them or believes them to be good leaders. • No, because the government makes promises to the youth which is never fulfilled.
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32. Are youth ever consulted on new government policy formation, especially for policies related to them? • No, just informed about policy (12) • Sometimes • They are consulted but nothing is done for them meetings are fruitless (4) • Sometimes elders represent youth – on youth issues. (2) • Affirmative action is given in Dire Dawa but not clear for what • Just awareness creation meetings
33. How do you think local CBOs have played a role in youth development? • Have created access to finance and enabled loans / promotion of savings (8) (Shala, Zeway Dugda, Midega Tola, Babile, Deder • Not any (5) • Have organized youth in groups to try to make them productive. (3 • Some youth have established their own (Dire Dawa) • Collaborate with youth at youth center • Organize and advise IGAs (3) • Employing youth 34. How do you think NGOs have played a role in youth development? • Not any (11) • Small support from HCS put not particularly for youth (Dire Dawa) • Provided youth counselling services to control youth migration (Dire Dawa) • Established youth group & provided technical training and support (Dire Dawa) • Some youth supported by ZOA for poultry (Midega Tola) • Improving life skills (Dire Dawa) • Family planning and STD protection (Dire Dawa) • We hear about them but most are unemployed and chewing chat • They are supported financially and with irrigation • NGOs play a vital role in connecting youth to government bodies (Midega Tola) • Provide training opportunities • Create IGA groups and credit 35. How do you think the government has played a role in youth development? • There is a policy but it is not implemented (9 • Only register unemployed youth • Initiates group formations • Conducted meetings with youth and make false promises • Don’t play a role (2) • Government has not addressed issues of youth empowerment • Provided small financial access (2) • Have made a training on how to use resources (Dire Dawa) (2) • Train at TVET - Midega Tola • Provide ag tools such as water pump and improved seeds. (Babile) • Work on behavioral change (Deder)
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ANNEX B: REFERENCES
• Bethlehem Lemma, Ethiopia: Government Provides over 2.3 million Hectares of Land for Investors. 2Merkato.com The biggest Ethiopian Business Portal. 14 May 2015. http://www.2merkato.com/news/alerts/3768-ethiopia-government-provides-over-23-million- hectares-of-land-for-investors • Celestine Katongole, Fiona Mulira & Wilber Manyisa Ahebwa; Comparative Assessment of Rural Youth Entrepreneurs in Uganda and Kenya • Ethiopia’s Key: Young People and the Demographic Dividend. PRB, Shelly Megquier and Kate Belohlav. December 2014 • Ethiopian Livestock-Ethiopia Country Commercial Guide, Export.gov. 6/21/2017 • Food and Agriculture Policy Decision Analysis (FAPDA). Country fact sheet on food and agriculture policy trends, Ethiopia. October 2014. • Gellaw, Abebe. Think Tank Deplores Ethiopia Land Grab Deals December 1st 2011. /www.oaklandinstitute.org/think-tank-deplores-ethiopia-land-grab-deals • OECD, Key Issues Facing Youth in Ethiopia. http://www.oecd.org/dev/inclusivesocietiesanddevelopment/youth-issues-in-ethiopia.htm • Oxfam. Rain Poverty Climate and Vulnerability in Ethiopia; Gov't to Establish 10-Billion Birr Mobile Youth Fund. October 10, 2016 http://www.ena.gov.et/en/index.php/economy/item/2073-gov-t-to- establish-10-billion-birr-mobile-youth-fund “147,000 Ethiopian Youth Benefited from the Youth Revolving Fund” https://www.ezega.com/News/NewsDetails/4623/147-000-Ethiopian-Youth-Benefited-from- Revolving-Fund-Government • Sosina Bezu. The conversion. Ethiopia can convert its youth bulge from a political problem into an opportunity. April 18, 2017 https://theconversation.com/ethiopia-can-convert-its-youth-bulge- from-a-political-problem-into-an-opportunity-75312 • SOSINA BEZU & STEIN HOLDEN. Are Rural youth in Ethiopia Abandoning Agriculture? 2014 • Umoya, Land grabbing and its dire consequences in Ethiopia February 2014
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ANNEX C: Tools
C1 – House to House Survey Questionnaire (community)
1. Interview #.:____ 2. Date: (m/dd) ___/___ / ___ 3. Zone ______4. Woreda: ______5. Kebele______6. Name interviewer(s) ______7. Age (years old / approx.): 8. Sex: (m-male, f-female) ____ A. General Perception: 9. How do you view male youth? Valuable Members of the Community/Society Useful /Productive members of the Community Neutral ineffective members of the Community Disrupters of the Community Do not consider 10. How do you view female youth? Valuable Members of the Community/Society Useful /Productive members of the Community Neutral ineffective members of the Community Disrupters of the Community Do not consider 11. What are the three most Urgent Challenges Facing Male Youth? (PUT NUMBERS 1, 2 or 3 in the box. With number 1 being the most urgent.) Existing Job Market Skills/ Education crime / drug use education politics mindset resource access 12. What are the three most Urgent Challenges Facing Female Youth? (PUT NUMBERS 1, 2 or 3 in the box. With number 1 being the most urgent.) Existing Job Market Skills/ Education crime / drug use education politics mindset resource access
B. Agency 13. Do you have persons you consider to be youth living in your home? yes no 14. What role do they play in your household? non-contributing member chores income generator caretaker They do nothing & are dependent
15. Do you see youth as independent? Strongly agree Agree Don’t Know Disagree Strongly Disagree
16. If so, what has given them tools to support themselves? education home influence /community (parental) government programmes community support NGO support other:______
17. If disagree, what is the cause of youth dependency? lack of education too much education lack of resources lack of opportunities drug use international influence other: ______
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18. What is different for today’s youth, than when you were at that age? access to land access to education type of education international influence political environment drug use
19. Where do you see youth potentially becoming the most productive members of society, in which sectors? Small Enterprise Small Work/Labor Leadership / Government work Professionals (i.e. – Doctors, professors, or other careers) agriculture manufacturing/food processing carpentry / Masonry sewing other:______
20. In which sectors do you see many youth working now? Small Enterprise Small Work/Labor Leadership / Government work Professionals (i.e. – Doctors, professors, or other careers) agriculture manufacturing/food processing carpentry / Masonry sewing other:______
C. Empowerment 21. In your opinion, how could youth best be supported to improve their position in the community? civic/ leadership training volunteer service psycho-social counseling Life Skills training work ethic training other ______
22. In your opinion, how could youth best be supported to improve their livelihoods? Access to Finance Skill Development access to jobs scholarships/education extension services other______
23. Which technical skill would be most useful for Livelihood Development? Commercial Vegetable Farming Commercial Grain Farming Commercial Animal Husbandry Food Processing Carpentry Tailor Electrician Mechanic other______
24. As community members of youth, do you feel that you have the capacity to guide them? Yes I often act as a role model In some instances I don’t understand the behavior no
25. Where could your capacity be built to better support youth to develop and become valuable members of the community? Mentoring/coaching Overall skills related to business Leadership motivating hard work Discipline other______
D. Access to Resources 26. Do you feel that youth have equal access to land use and or ownership as the rest of the population? Male: Yes No Sometimes Don’t know Female: Yes No Sometimes Don’t know 27. Do youth have access to the resources they need to become productive members of society?
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Strongly agree Agree Don’t Know Disagree Strongly Disagree
28. Which business resources do they have access to? Capital Land Business Skills Training Savings Business info Technical Training Skills Don’t know Other______
E. Equity 29. Do young men/women have the right to participate in decisions made in the community? Male Strongly agree Agree Don’t Know Disagree Strongly Disagree Female Strongly agree Agree Don’t Know Disagree Strongly Disagree 30. For decisions made in the community, do you think young men/women should have the ability to contribute input? Male Strongly agree Agree Don’t Know Disagree Strongly Disagree Female Strongly agree Agree Don’t Know Disagree Strongly Disagree 31. Do you think youth men/women should be able to be in leadership positions in the community or in local government? Male Strongly agree Agree Don’t Know Disagree Strongly Disagree Female Strongly agree Agree Don’t Know Disagree Strongly Disagree
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C2 – Community Focus Group Discussion (FGD) Questionnaire
1. Interview #.:____ 2. Date: (m/dd) ___/___ / ___ 3. Zone ______4. Woreda: ______5. Kebele______6. Name interviewer ______Sex(s) #: (m-male, f-female) 7. (m)_____ 8. (f)______A. Group Assessment on Experience: 10. FGD Group Type Elder Group: Women group: 11. Is there any policy amongst your community/kebele (written or unwritten) to include youth in your activities or activities developed to support youth? Male: Yes No Female: Yes No 12. Explain: 13. Are youth participating in leadership roles (Note if there are women) and in your community/kebele (not needed to be asked in the discussion with elders)? Male: Yes No Sometimes Female: Yes No Sometimes 14. Explain B. Perceptions of the Situation of Youth 15. What are the three most Urgent Challenges Facing Youth (Discuss the difference between men and women)? 16. How are the male viewed by the community? (guide them in terms of utility, productive vrs. Non- productive) 17. How does this view differ for young women? (guide them in terms of utility, productive vrs. Non- productive) C. Agency 18. Do you see youth as Independent or Dependent? (Explain their behavior related to this.) 19. If youth are independent, what makes them independent and what has given them tools to support themselves? 20. If youth are dependent, what makes them dependent and what is the cause of this dependency? 21. Where do you see youth potentially becoming the most productive members of society, in which sectors? 22. Where do you see youth being or becoming destructive members of society? Try to be specific 23. When you were a youth, were youth productive members of society? What in the environment has changed to create the current situation? 24. What obstacles are there to “harnessing the power of the youth”? 25. How do you see those obstacles being overcome? D. Empowerment 26. In your opinion, how could youth best be supported to improve their position in the community?
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27. In your opinion, how could youth best be supported to improve their livelihoods? E. Youth Access to Resources: 28. Traditionally, do youth have access to community resources? Is this honored today? (Differentiate between Men and Women.) 29. Legally, do youth have access to community resources? Is this honored today? (Differentiate between Men and Women.) 30. Does the government provide any support for youth? F. Youth Equity 31. Are youth able to seek leadership positions in local governing bodies? Are there any youth in leadership positions? (probe: is there overt discrimination or any type of affirmative action?) 32. Are youth ever consulted on new government policy formation, especially for policies related to them? E. Institutional Support 33. How do you think Local CBOs have played a role in youth development? 34. How do you think NGOs have played a role in youth development? 35. How do you think the government has played a role in youth development?
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C3 – Government Key Informant Interview (KII) Questionnaire
1. Interview #: ____ 2. Date: (m/dd) ___/___ / ___ 3. Zone ______4. Woreda: ______5. Name interviewer(s) ______6. Office: ______7. Position / Title in Department: ______8. Name of Respondent ______9. Age (years old / approx): ____ 10. Sex: (m-male, f-female) ______
A. Organizational Assessment on Experience: 11. Does your department have any past, current or future projects focused on supporting youth? Past Projects: Yes No Present Projects: Yes No Future Projects: Yes No 12. Please list Projects & the Year: 13. Does your Department have personnel, whom are dedicated to work on youth issues (focal person)? Yes No 14. If so, How Many? _____ 15. What is their skill set? (can select more than one) Training /Facilitation Employability for Youth Entrepreneurship Life Skills Dialogue Technical Skills Other Explain Other: 16. Which skills need to be developed further? (can select more than one) Training /Facilitation Employability for Youth Entrepreneurship Life Skills Dialogue Technical Skills Other 17. Do you have any youth (18-29yrs) employed in your department? (Note if there are women) (put the number) Male ______ Female______18. What have you the government tried to do in the past to improve the situation of youth? create jobs support for business internships education discipline cultural/sports other 19. Explain: 20. Do you provide any resources for improving the situation of youth? (i.e.: Access to skills, capital, education, scholarships, etc.) Yes No Attempts made In the plan 21. Explain: 22.. Which Resources have or do you provided? (PUT NUMBERS 1, 2 or 3 in the box. With number 1 being the most provided.) Skill Development / Training Access to Finance Youth TVET policy framework/enabling environment (youth affirmative action) micro-finance other 23. Explain: 24. What are your main strengths in supporting youth development? (PUT NUMBERS 1, 2 or 3 in the box. With number 1 being the main strength.) Skill Development / Training Access to Finance Youth TVET policy framework/enabling environment (youth affirmative action) micro-finance other 25. Explain: 26. What are your main weaknesses in supporting youth development? (PUT NUMBERS 1, 2 or 3 in the box. With number 1 being the main weakness.)
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Skill Development / Training Access to Finance Youth TVET policy framework/enabling environment (youth affirmative action) micro-finance other 27. Explain: 28. What is stopping you from supporting youth? Budget Capacity Transportation Expertise Content/Material Training Resources other 29. Explain: 30. How can you as the government provide support in creating more jobs for youth? (PUT NUMBERS 1, 2 or 3 in the box. With number 1 being the best way to support job creation.) Government Public Works agriculture Factory food sector Livestock micro-finance 31. Explain: 32. Do you have a youth policy (different than the 2004 general youth policy)? yes No If yes, how in particular, does that policy support issues of youth, such as? (If they don’t, just put N/A) 33. Youth participating in leadership roles in your department (such as affirmative action or requiring a certain position to be for youth)? 34.Youth’s ability to access to land, livelihood activities and other resources governed by your department? (Is there a specific policy for this?) 35. Youth participation in Decision Making related to policies that affect them in your Department? (Is there prescribed process on how to include youth on policies that impact their lives?) 36. How have you helped to support the development of youth in the community? Youth Community center Youth volunteerism / service Youth Invited to Meetings you hold in the community Other 37. Explain: 38. How do you think, you as the government have played a role in youth development? positive negative Both None 39. Explain
B. Perceptions of the Situation of Youth 40. What are the three most Urgent Challenges Facing Youth? (PUT NUMBERS 1, 2 or 3 in the box. With number 1 being the most urgent.) Existing Job Market Skills/ Education crime / drug use education politics mindset resource access 41. Other 42. How does the government view youth in general? Discussion Male Valuable Members of the Community/Society Useful /Productive members of the Community Neutral ineffective members of the Community Disrupters of the Community Female Valuable Members of the Community/Society Useful/Productive members of the Community Neutral ineffective members of the Community Disrupters of the Community other 43. EXPLAIN 44. Where do you see youth being or becoming destructive members of society? Try to be specific Drug use Hostile Demeanor Hoodlums / gangs Overall Crime & or Conflict other 45. What obstacles are there to “harnessing the power of the youth”?
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46. How do you see those obstacles being overcome? 47. Does Climate Change have an Impact on their ability to earn an income?
C. Agency 48. Do you see youth as Independent? Strongly agree Agree Don’t Know Disagree Strongly Disagree 49. Explain 50. If so, what has given them tools to support themselves? education home influence /community (parental) government programmes community support NGO support other 51. Explain 52. If disagree, what is the cause of youth dependency? lack of education too much education lack of resources lack of opportunities drug use international influence other 53. Explain 54. Where do you see youth potentially becoming the most productive members of society, in which sectors? (PUT NUMBERS 1, 2 or 3 in the box. With number 1 being the best sector.) Small Enterprise Small Work/Labor Leadership / Government work Professionals (i.e. –Doctors, professors, or other careers) agriculture manufacturing/food processing carpentry / Masonry sewing Other 55. Describe: 56. When you were a youth, were youth productive members of society? What in the environment has changed to create the current situation?
D. Empowerment 57. In your opinion, how could youth best be supported to improve their position in the community? civic/ leadership training Volunteer service psycho-social counseling Life Skills training work ethic training other 58. Explain Options & other 59. In your opinion, how could youth best be supported to improve their livelihoods? Access to Finance Skill Development / Training access to jobs scholarships/education extension services other 60. Explain Options & other:
E. Youth Access to Resources (also covered above): 61. Traditionally, do youth have access to community resources? Is this honored today? Land Animals Tools Water health other 62. Explain: 63. Legally, do youth have access to community resources? Is this honored today? Land Animals Tools Water health other 64. Explain: 65. Are you familiar with the new Government Youth Fund? Yes No 66. What are your ideas on how government, at the Woreda level, can could support the proper use of this facility?
F. Youth Equity 67. Are youth able to seek leadership positions in local governing bodies like yours?
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(probe: Does it seem that there is overt discrimination or any type of affirmative action?) Yes No Maybe 68. Are there any youth in leadership positions? Male: Yes No Female: Yes No 69. Explain 70. Are youth ever consulted on new government policy formation, especially for policies related to them? Yes No Sometimes 71. Explain 72. How do you think Local NGOs/CBOs have played a role in youth development? positive negative Both None 73. What could they do better? Explain: 74. How do you think International NGOs have played a role in youth development? positive negative Both None 75. What could they do better?
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C4 – Implementing Partner Key Informant Interview (KII) Questionnaire A 1. Interview #.:______2. Date: (m/dd) ___/___/___ 3. Zone ______4. Woreda(s): ______6. Name interviewer ______7. Implementing Partner: ______8. Staff Interviewed: ______8.1 Program/Unit: ______8.2 Position (Optional): ______8.3 Exp in MSC/HCS: ____Yrs
A. Organizational Assessment on Experience:
9. What projects have you been engaged with focusing on youth in the past and what projects are you currently working on? ______
9.1 Past Projects: ______9.2 Present Projects: ______
10. Do you have officers dedicated to youth programming and youth issues? If yes; How many? ______
11. If so, what are their competency areas?
12. What skills do they (the staff) need to be developed further??
Training /Facilitation Employability for Youth Entrepreneurship Life Skills Dialogue Technical Skills Other
12.1 Explain:
13. What types of livelihood programmes have you implemented in the past? Provide some "general lessons" learned from past projects
14. Do you have youth (18-29yrs) working for your organization? (Note if there are women) Explain.
B. PERCEPTIONS OF THE SITUATION OF YOUTH
15. What are the three most Urgent Challenges Facing Youth? Are they different for male and female youth? Priority 15.1 Male youth 15.2 Female Youth 1 2
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3
16. How are the young men viewed by the community? Discussion (Productive or non-productive)
17. How does this view differ for young women? (Productive or non-productive)
C. AGENCY
18. Do you see youth as Independent or dependent?
19. If they are independent, what makes them independent and what has given them the ability to be independent?
20. If they are dependent, what makes them dependent and what is the cause of this behavior?
21. Where do you see youth potentially becoming the most productive members of society, in which sectors? 22. Where do you see youth being or becoming destructive members of society? Try to be specific
23. When you were a youth, were youth productive members of society? What in the environment has changed to create the current situation?
24. What obstacles are there to “harnessing the power of the youth”?
25. How do you see those obstacles being overcome?
26.Does Climate Change have an Impact on their ability to earn an income?
D. EMPOWERMENT
27. In your opinion, how could youth best be supported to improve their position in the community?
28. In your opinion, how could youth best be supported to improve their livelihoods?
E. YOUTH ACCESS TO RESOURCES:
NOTE: Use the options as a guide, but do not need to be stringent with them, encourage a open conversation.
29. What organizations currently exist for youth?
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Youth advocacy groups Youth livelihood groups Cooperatives University Groups Other
29.1 Describe Other
30. Does the government provide any support for youth?
Access to Finance Skill Development Training access to jobs (public works) scholarships/education extension services other
30.1 Explain Options & other
Probe further for a comment on the situation of “land” in the different areas if not mentioned:
31. Are you familiar with the new Government Youth Fund? What are your ideas on how your organization could support the proper use of this facility? Yes No
31.1 Explain:
32. Traditionally, do youth have access to community resources? Is this honored today? Land Animals Tools Water health other
32.1 Explain:
33. Legally, do youth have access to community resources? Is this honored today? Land Animals Tools Water health other
33. 1 Explain:
F. YOUTH EQUITY
34. Are youth able to seek leadership positions in local governing bodies? Are there any youth in leadership positions? (probe: is there overt discrimination or any type of affirmative action?)
35. Are youth ever consulted on new government policy formation, especially for policies related to them?
E. INSTITUTIONAL SUPPORT
36. Are there local NGOs/CBOs working on Youth Development? (List them)
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37. How do you think local CBOs/NGOs have played a role in youth development?
38. How do you think International NGOs have played a role in youth development?
39. How do you think the government has played a role in youth development
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ANNEX D: Youth Multi-Stakeholder Assessment SoW
Scope of Work Multi-Stakeholder Assessment of Youth Development For the DFSA/ELRP, Ethiopia
July 2017 Prepared by Lauren Servin for Mercy Corps
1. Background
1.1 Mercy Corps Mercy Corps is an international, non-governmental humanitarian relief and development organization that exists to alleviate suffering and poverty by helping people build secure, productive and sustainable community driven changes. Mercy Corps helps people turn the crises they confront into the opportunities they deserve. Driven by local needs, our programs provide communities in the world’s toughest places with the tools and support they need to transform their own lives and livelihoods. Mercy Corps Ethiopia is operating in Somali, Oromiya, Addis Ababa, and SNNPR in the sectors of Water and Sanitation, Economic Development, Livelihoods, Capacity Building, Emergency Response, Health and Nutrition and similar sectors.
1.2 Development Food Security Activity (DFSA) - Ethiopian Livelihoods and Resiliency Program (ELRP) Mercy Corps is an implementing partner under Catholic Relief Services (CRS) for a USAID Food For Peace-funded Development Food Security Activity (DFSA) for Ethiopia. The CRS DFSA- Ethiopian Livelihoods and Resiliency Program (ELRP), intends to improve food access and incomes through agriculture and other livelihoods initiatives; enhance natural resource and environmental management; combat under nutrition, especially for children under two and pregnant and lactating women; and mitigate disaster impact through early warning and community preparedness activities. The ELRP is intended to build resilience in populations vulnerable to chronic hunger and repeated hunger crises, and to reduce their future need for ongoing or emergency food assistance. The program is a 5-year program, commencing in October 2016.
1.3 Youth component of DFSA/ELRP: DFSA/ELRP will promote more equitable decision-making while focusing on areas that directly impact resilience, nutrition and food security. Incorporating learning from previous DFAP project and gender and youth assessments that will be conducted in Y1, DFSA/ELRP will create an enabling environment to promote gender- and youth-based equity in access to, and control of community and HH resources, and to enhance women and youth’s leadership and participation in decision- and policy-making processes. In line with these DFSA/ELRP project will work towards the following objectives for youth, both women and men: • Women and youthYoung women and men have increased access to and control of community and HH resources (SPX 1) • Rural women and youth have increased their ability to make meaningful decisions and choices for their lives (IO X1.1)
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• Community systems and structures increased participation of women and youth in equitable decision-making (IO X.1.2) • Young adults are gainfully employed. (IO 2.1.3)
1.4 Purpose These assessments of the perceptions of the community, the government and the implementing partners are being conducted to understand the perceptions of the community, implementing partners (IPs) and Government of Ethiopia (GoE) at the Woreda level on the position of youth mainly relating to their ability to be productive and contributing members of society along with understanding the capacity of the existing institutions and organizations to improve the position of youth. These assessments aim to uncover the environment surrounding the abilities and gaps of stakeholders to contribute to the development of young people and how that impacts their progress. The assessment will then aim to inform interventions which can enable youth to participate in their development in an equitable manner and to be in a position where they actively contribute to their communities to create more positive perception of youth amongst stakeholders.
Overall Learning Question: What is the relationship between stakeholder perceptions and experiences on positive youth development and youth’s position in society and how can current capacities be upgraded to improve youth’s economic independence and position to become contributing members in the community.
5) To collect early project phase information related to community perceptions and institutional capabilities to inform interventions relating to improving the position of youth as it relates to equitable distribution of resources and youth agency in decision making. 6) The analysis will also inform specific interventions that will build the capacity of the different stakeholders being assessed to improve the position of youth. 7) It will also support the contextualization of the Mercy Corp’s Transferable Skills Curriculum Plus (TSC+) aimed at improving youths position based on study outcomes.
2. Research Methodology for Multi-Stakeholder Assessment of Youth Development 2.1 Research Methodology This is a multi-stakeholder assessment, which seeks to provide a comprehensive view of the environment surrounding youth development and engagement. Each group of stakeholders will answer a different set of survey questions and will also have different types of assessment tools. Some of the stakeholder assessments will be an illustrative sample while others will have results that are a representative sample. All interviews will seek to probe stakeholders on opinions, perceptions, actual ongoing physical and proposed activities, physical resources and actions related to both young men and women in their communities. There will be four types of interview processes key informant individual qualitative and quantitative interviews, focus group discussions, quantitative individual interviews and workshop mapping. The methodologies for each group of stakeholders is explained in detail below under section 2.4. Assessment Topics 1) Assessment of Community perceptions of youth equity, agency and empowerment, and previous experience in youth development and engagement. 2) Assessment of Implementing Partners perceptions of youth equity, agency and empowerment, and previous experience in youth development and engagement
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3) Assessment of GoE perceptions of youth equity, agency and empowerment, and previous experience in youth development and engagement. (specific capacity related to each capacity,
2.2 Measured Outcomes & Outputs for the project This research is being conducted in order to support the project in effectively reaching the targets highlighted below. This research is focused on assessing the current enabling environment concerning youth development for effectiveness in implementing the DFSA/ELRP programmes in the target areas, which may facilitate attaining results as detailed in the project Logical Framework for ELRP. The assessments are organized to acquire knowledge related to the capacity of community members, local organizations and the government in youth development, to be able to play a role in achieving the below outcomes and outputs. The overall assessment is designed with these indicators in mind and will support the understanding of how the project can support the interviewed stakeholder groups to reach these targets. Assessments will look at existing capacities locally to implement youth programmes needed to reach the below indicators, which will inform the project of the areas that need focus on building local capacity: Targets Focused on Youth Capacity Building 1) Percentage of trained youth able to increase individual and/or household assets and incomes. (outcome) 2) Number (and percentage of total trained) of youth six months after completion of training receiving new employment, new self-employment or better employment as a result of participation in USG-funded workforce development programs, disaggregated by Sex. (outcome) 3) Percentage change in competencies or skills acquired by youth, as measured by locally or internationally recognized or certified assessment tool, as a result of program activities, disaggregated by sex (outcome) 4) Percentage of clients receiving employment related skills training, disaggregated by sex and age group (output) 5) Percentage of young adults who received employment related skills training are gainfully employed, disaggregated by sex and age group (outcome) 6) Proportion of female participants in USG‐ assisted programs designed to increase access to productive economic resources (assets, credit, income or employment), disaggregated by age group (output) Percentage of clients receiving employment related skills training, disaggregated by sex and age group (output) 7) Number of young adults received follow up services (output)
Targets focused on Community Engagement and Leadership 8) Number of project established/strengthened community conversation groups, gender and youth clubs, and livelihood groups that are exposed to gender and youth awareness events. (output) 9) Number of women in leadership roles in community structures (FSTFs, appeal committees, project formed groups or committees of WASH and Livelihood), disaggregated by type of community structure (output) 10) Number of community leaders oriented on gender roles, gender equality and equity, and youth engagement (output)
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2.3 Target Group to for which the questionnaire is organized & who is interviewed The target group of the project are youth, men and women ages 18 – 29 and this will be made clear on the questionnaire, that they are the focus of the content of the interviews. During the Individual interview with the government and the implementing partners, there will likely be few to no youth present. During the focus groups there may by chance be some youth participants. For the focus group meetings, it will not be necessary to remove any youth group members, rather it will be important to catalogue their perspective related to the questions and disaggregate them from the non-youth respondents. For the house-to house interviews it is advised to inquire the age of the respondent and if that respondent falls into the age of a youth, it should be inquired for another person in the house to be identified of an older age.
2.4 Development of Questionnaires The questionnaire is developed using mechanisms that will enable qualitative and quantitative data to be collected. Qualitative data will be very critical in providing supporting information that can be applied to interventions and contextualization of the TSC. These questionnaires are seeking the opinions and perceptions of the stakeholder’s related to youth’s position within their own organizations and the community. Some questions will probe into the gender differences related to youth’s position in society.
The questionnaires are developed initially by the consultant, in consultation with the Youth programme manager. They will be further adapted and contextualized with programme staff through the youth assessment training.
In addition, a small stakeholder mapping workshop will be developed, which will encompass the implementing partners identifying all positive and negative actors in the youth development space. This exercise will highlight supporters of youth development and potential spoilers in youth development.
2.5 Youth Development Assessments of Community, GoE and IPs Research Methodologies Overview As noted above, there will be three assessments carried out for the different stakeholders, which are the Community, the Government of Ethiopia (at woreda level) and the Implementing Partners. All of the stakeholders will undergo a survey type interview process, where they will be asked to provide information that is both qualitative and quantitative in nature. Some survey’s will be mixed qualitative and quantitative, while others will be either quantitative or qualitative. Each set of stakeholders will have their own tailored survey each having its own methodology. There will be four different types of research methodologies executed, which are detailed below.
2.5.1 Community Assessments: a. Community Focus Group Discussions (qualitative questionnaire): Community focus groups will be conducted with key persons from women’s and elders’ groups in the community and will hold qualitative interviews, which will be summarized in explanatory tables. These discussions will have 8-to-12 people from different existing influential groups in the community. There will be 2 focus groups per woreda, which will be community elders and women’s groups who can provide insights on youth’s participation in their respective groups and also to provide a general ‘expert’ birds eye view of youth’s overall position in the community. This will be done in a survey
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questionnaire style, where group members will get open-ended questions for which they are encouraged to answer freely. This method of interview is being utilized to surface feelings and attitudes towards the research topic, that might not come through from an individual interview. A sample of 2 community groups in each Woreda will be interviewed in detail about their perceptions on the position of youth, their potential and their socio-economic position (meaning their level of engagement in community groups and government, along with understanding the equitable distribution of resources within the community). This will not be a random sampling, but rather will be identified using existing knowledge from local IPs and project staff actively seeking out assumed or known community groups. Specifically, local women’s groups & elders’ groups have been selected to be interviewed as the elders group can provide a perspective from community leadership and the women’s group can provide more insight into the gendered aspect of youth development. b. Individual Community Member Survey’s / House-to-House (quantitative questionnaire): To gain a non-biased picture of the community’s perception and actions towards youth, it is recommended to do a random sampling by seeking out respondents through house-to-house interviews in each zone. These will be 20-minutes interviews with quantitative questionnaires, related the community’s view of youth, their potential and the areas where local institutions and community groups are providing and can provide pathways for the development and inclusion of youth. A total of 450 community members in the ELRP operational woredas, will be interviewed providing a representative sample of community opinion and experience for the overall project area. A sample of 384 is sufficient for any population above 100,000, According to Krejcie & Morgan (1970),
One hundred fifty Community Members will be interviewed in each of the three zones for a total of 450 respondents, in the rural areas and the houses will be found by locating one random house to start from and having the enumerators walk to select every 3 houses. This random house can be identified by using a household list from a community institution such as a health center and randomly selecting the house from that list. It is important that this is followed closely, pending home absence and demographic restrictions, as to make sure that enumerators do not select houses according to appearance and bring bias into the selection process. After, every 30 interviews (or at the beginning of each day), another random point in a different neighborhood will be selected. For the case where there are 4 woreda per zone, each woreda will have a total of 38 respondents and the new random point will be selected in each woreda after 38 respondents have been interviewed. For each community member, they will be asked their age & sex and if the person is within the youth age range they will need to be skipped and another person in the house will be sought out for an interview. These interviews will be completely anonymous and the project will need to get the proper government approvals ahead of time. Interviews will also require badges and letters from the government to show respondents approving the study.
2.5.2 GoE Assessments: Individual Interviews with Government Departments (qualitative & quantitative questionnaire):
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Different departments of local government will be individually interviewed for a period of 45 to 60 minutes using both qualitative and quantitative questions. The sample size will be demonstrative of the government’s view and developmental capacity related to youth. Different departments will be interviewed to gain an overall understanding of the government’s existing capacities and planned activities to improve the situation of youth.
A sample of ten local government offices will be interviewed, which have been pre- selected by the project. Depending on the office, it is suggested to speak with either department heads and or experts. It is not recommended to speak directly with the Office Head. The lower level technocrats are the most advisable to interview as they will have a better perspective on the day-to-day workings of the government and actual implementable activities, rather than government political agendas alone. There can be more than one government officer present during the interview. Where feasible, it will be requested to provide any policy statements that they might have with regards to youth participation or youth programming within their department / ministry. This can be used to compare, with that is actually being implemented by these local institutions.
The specific government offices to interview: The government departments to be interviewed are: 1. Youth and Sports; 2. Women and Child Affairs; 3. Labor & Social Affairs; 4. Health; 5. Micro- and Small Enterprise; 6. Pastoralist Development/Agriculture; 7. Education; 8. Cooperative & Marketing; 9. Disaster Preparedness and Prevention; 10. Finance and Economy Development
2.5.3 Implementing Partner (IPs)Assessments: Group Interviews: Local implementing partners will undergo Individual qualitative interview questionnaire each 90 minutes. The questionnaire will have formal questions, this can a candid interview to probe about ongoing youth capacities in the communities, the position of youth and also looking deeper at the bigger picture of their interactions with community institutions and the government. This could be the final interview conducted, as to prevent the interviewers from going into the focus groups and government interviews with an already biased view. However, the IPs can be consulted initially to provide support in linking to community groups and government officials where necessary, if not able to locate through office visits alone.
The Two Implementing partners will be interviewed, with 8 from each organization for a total of 16 people. Partner selection has already been completed by the project and the interviewers will interact with those implementing partners only. While the IPs will act as key informants for the overall picture, it is important that Mercy Corps staff remain unbiased during the subsequent assessments.
Table 2.4.3: Personal and time Requirements for IPs: Activity Personnel Time Total Time
IPs Interviews Youth 120 minutes each 4 hours Development (plan accordingly Officers and 4 project staff
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2.6 Scope The assessments for the three topic areas will be carried out in four administrative zones. These zones are grouped into three areas, which comprise of a total of 9 woredas. In each woreda there will be 2 focus group discussions and 10 government offices visited and for each of the three areas, 150 respondents will be individually interviewed. The scope of these assessments is limited to four administrative zones, which are grouped into three assessment areas as indicated in the table below.
Zone/Area Woredas GoE Community Community Focus Groups Individual East Haraghe Zone, Babile, Deder, Melka 40 8* 150 Oromia Region Belo, and Midega Tola woredas (4 Woredas) Dire Dawa, Dire Dawa Dire Dawa 10 2* 150 Administration Zeway Dugda woreda Arsi / West Arsi Zone, 40 8* 150 Heben Aris, Shala, and Oromia Region Arsi Negele woredas (4 Woredas)
Total Interviews 90 18 450
*key informant interviews will be added where seen to provide a special insight
2.7 Data Analysis After each zone is surveyed Data will be inputted into excel spread sheets. From the government interviews, focus groups and IP interviews, the qualitative data will be summarized and grouped into points having similar responses and will be grouped and coded. However, their qualitative answers will also be filled into an excel spreadsheet. The prevalence of these responses will be noted for the record, in a separate column.
For the Individual community survey, the percentage prevalence of each perception and or practice will be tabulated and all options specified on the questionnaires will be compared to each other. The percentages will be compared based on highest response rate for the different questions. Some questions may provide answers that are somewhat evenly distributed and others will have answers that show a majority perception or action. This will provide a picture of the position of youth in the community and where different stakeholders are working towards improving the situation of youth and where there are gaps in action. The correlation between the gaps in action and the perception of youth will also be analyzed according to majority perception and majority action.
All data will be summarized in a final report and conclusions related to youth’s position according to the stakeholder’s answers will be deducted and related to ELRP programme goals. This will then be applied to recommendations for areas to intervene.
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2.8 Statistical Significance Some of the data points will be looked at with regards to existing studies relating to the perceptions of youth and youth participation. Where data exists, these numbers can be used to test against and where they don’t, there can be an assumption of an estimated prevalence rate deducted from project knowledge and or existing documentation of a selected perception or activity to create an estimated rate to test against.
2.9 Logistics and Practical Organization The overall assessment will take a period of 3 weeks depending on how many or the zones are being worked on simultaneously. One week in each zone. The lead for this assessment will be the Youth Development officer supported by 2 technical staff and 13 project staff. This group will be responsible for the Workshop, the Individual IP interviews and tool testing, the GoE interviews and the Community Focus Groups. For the community house-to-house interviews, a team of about four local researchers must be recruited and trained. They will be collecting field data for 4 potentially 5 days (depending on speed) in each zone to reach 150 interviews. This team will be led by a lead coordinator who will supervise the survey. On the first day, the coordinators main role will be to correct the enumerators for any poorly entered data. On the following consecutive days, the coordinator will be entering data into the data collection system. More teams can be added to make the process faster and this can be run in different zones simultaneously. There will need to be a “leader” for each of the zones. This leader should be a project staff member, who can correct the enumerators if there are errors in their data entry form. Therefore, after the first couple of interviews, the “leader” should check the forms immediately to correct for any questionnaires that have been filled out wrong. This is very important because the team could run into a situation, where all questionnaires have been filled out wrong and then the data will be deemed unusable. So to avoid this, questionnaires must be checked early and throughout the data collection time period. The “leader” will also be responsible for entering all data into the excel data sheet.
Zone/Area Woredas FGD HH (L) HH(E) GoE(E) IP
East Haraghe Babile 2 1 Leader 2 2 The Youth Zone, Oromia Enumerators for two Enumerators Enumerators Manger and Region Deder (staff) teams two support (Team 1) (Team 1) staff 1 (Teams Melka Belo 2 2 Independent 1&2) Enumerators Enumerators Midega Tola (Team 1) (Team 2) (Team 2) Dire Dawa, Dire Dire Dawa Use same 1 Leader 4 2 Dawa team as for two Enumerators Enumerators Administration above or teams (Team 3 & 4) (Team 1) below (Teams 3&4) Zeway 1 Leader Arsi / West Arsi 2 2 2 Dugda for two Zone, Oromia Enumerators Enumerators Enumerators Heben Aris teams Region (staff) (Team 1) (Team 1) (Teams Shala 1&2)
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Zone/Area Woredas FGD HH (L) HH(E) GoE(E) IP Arsi Negele 1 2 2 Independent Enumerators Enumerators Siraro (Team2) Boset (Team 2) (Team 2)
2.9a Community Focus Group and Individual Government The total amount of time for these interviews will be roughly 28 hours, with time planed for logistics in between. Therefore, interviewers will conduct roughly 5 to 6 interviews per day, with about 2 hours of logistical time scattered throughout and time factored in for lunch. While some interviews will be planned ahead of time, some will need to be planned during the assessment week as there may be some unknown groups. These interviews should be conducted by two project staff and one independent hired experienced enumerator for support of external, unbiased collection of information. Project staff will need to be as unbiased as possible, but it will be valuable for both probing deeper into the questions and for contextualization for project staff to be a part of this assessment.
Table 2.9a: Personnel and Time Required for GoE and FGD Assessment Mercy Corps Enumerators Time Interviews per day Total # of Total Personnel days Interviews needed ELRP GoE 4 project 60 minutes 10 (5 or 6 per team) 9 90 Individual staff, (2 each teams) Community 4 project 2 120 2 to 3 (depending 10 18 FGD staff independent, minutes on travel between highly skilled each woredas)
2.9b Individual Community Member Survey’s / House-to-House These surveys will roughly take 50 hours, with about 15-18 interviews a day (each taking 20 minutes), factoring in time for walking, introductions and lunch. This is to be done by externally hired enumerators. It is advisable to potentially have different enumerators for different zones, trained in the same way, due to potential over exhaustion if having to engage in 450 surveys over the course of 4 weeks. It may occur that the data collected in the beginning, may be stronger than the data collected at the end, due to repetition fatigue.
Diagram 2.9b: House-to-House Personnel Structure for Implementation of Study with Two Zones Simultaneously. (Following week, next two zone can be completed, for a total of two weeks).
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Youth Manager
Coordinator Coordinator Mercy Corp Staff Mercy Corp Staff Zone one Zone two
E1 E2 E3 E4 E1 E2 E3 E4
Team 1 Team 2 Team1 Team 2 *E=Enumerator Table 2.9b: Personnel and Time required for House-to-House Assessment Mercy Corps Enumerators Time Interviews Total # of Total Personnel per day days needed Interviews ELRP+LRO Community 2 Lead 8 independent, 20 min 36 per 10 Days (5 450 House-to- Coordinators skilled per per woreda for each House from project Zone. * 2 interview (15 – 18 zone) staff per Zone teams = 8 total per team) *2 teams = 2 total
Schedule When What Who August 7th Tool Finalized Consultant & Youth Manager August 14th – Training on Assessments and Consultant and Youth Manager 16th Contextualization August 17th – Collection of Data for 3 assessments in the Youth Manager, Mercy Corps Staff, Sept 4th field (two zones done simultaneously) Enumerators. September IP Assessments Workshop Youth Manage & Mercy Corps Staff 5th September Data Analysis & Report Writing, First Consultant 11th to 24th Draft Due on the 24th October 1st Validation Youth Manager October 3rd Feedback Compiled and sent to Youth Manager Consultant October 10th Second Draft Due Consultant
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