Minister of Labour Colin Jordan has urged employers to give young Barbadians a fair chance at entering the workforce, warning that persistent unemployment among youth could have serious social and economic consequences.
Speaking on Wednesday at a stakeholder engagement meeting for the Job Start Plus Programme, at Sandals Barbados Resort and Spa, Dover, Christ Church, Jordan pointed to stark disparities in unemployment rates between young people and the national average.
“Youth employment…statistics bear out what we are saying,” he noted. “In 2023, there were 14 000 young people in the labour force. Of that number, 21.4 per cent were unemployed. Now you have to juxtapose that with the national unemployment number, which at this time was a little bit over 7.5 per cent. It is lower now, but at that point it was about just over 7.5 per cent, 7.6 per cent. The young people are disproportionately represented in the ranks of the unemployed.”
The Job Start Plus Programme, introduced in 2019, targets Barbadians aged 16 to 24, helping them gain work experience to boost their employability. Jordan said the initiative was designed to address one of the biggest challenges facing youth—employers’ reluctance to hire those without experience.
“So if we recognise the frustration that we ourselves experience, then we can understand a little bit better the frustration that some of our young people will experience when we ask them for 12 months of experience, but nobody has given them the opportunity to get one day of experience,” he said. “Youth unemployment and reducing it is an economic imperative.”
The minister stressed that while the government has a role to play in supporting young people in their transition from school into the workforce, the responsibility cannot rest solely on the State.
“The government cannot be the only employer of last resort. Sometimes there are people who you may think are not suitable for employment. But I want you to give some thought to the fact that if everybody you thought was unsuitable was left as we say at the side of the road, what quality of life you would experience…,” he said. “I say that not to ask you to do anything that would put your business at risk, but to recognise that there is a responsibility on the shoulders of all of us to give people a first chance, in some cases a second chance, in some cases a third chance.”
Jordan also challenged the tendency to criticise youth rather than support them. “The time has come, the time has passed, for us to be bashing young people…too many of us neglect to do what we possibly could do to help young people,” he said. (SB)
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