South Sudan

John Jal Dak Ruot ,

Please provide us with your views on the state of youth (un)employment in your country, and how it affects your country's state of peace

As of 2018, youth unemployment in South Sudan stands at 12%. It is a country that has experienced conflict for almost all her life time, since independence from Sudan in 2011. Young people constitute almost 72% of the population, yet they are most unemployed. South Sudan suffers from Structural Unemployment, wherein youth possess skills that are not in demand. There is a mismatch wherein they lack skills that are in high demand. Additionally, rampant corruption within the government, means that South Sudanese people shy away from certain jobs. Their culture prevents them from taking up jobs such as cleaning and carpentry etc.

How does your work and/or activism promote youth employment and/or sustainable peace?

We train the youth in conflict resolution and help them act as peace Ambassadors. We were among the Civil Society Organizations that were responsible for drafting the Youth Development Policy for South Sudan Government, the purpose of which was to adopt and sign into law support and funding for youth initiatives. We support youth by training them with livelihood skills and entrepreneurship knowledge to run start ups and initiatives. We advocate for refugee youth employment in Uganda. Here there is a 70%- 30% policy for refugees and hosts respectively. We offered volunteering work for over 30 young people to perfect their skills and gradually learn skills that support their life skills. We currently support 5 enterprises that have 30 people each with grants of 2 million each by offering them free training skills.