Yogya to host youth convention

Some 100 young people from the provinces of Yogyakarta and Central Java are to attend a two-day convention on youth employment in Indonesia, to be held on Oct. 16 and Oct. 17 at Yogyakarta's Muhammadiyah University (UMY).

Titled "Youth Employment in Indonesia: Challenge, Opportunity and Strategy," the convention is jointly organized by the International Labor Organization (ILO), the Ministry of Manpower and Transmigration and the Management Development Center of UMY's school of economics.

According to the head of the Management Development Center, Siti Dyah Handayani, the convention was aimed at facilitating the participation of young people in the formulation and implementation of government policies on youth employment.

In the convention, participants would engage in group discussions, focusing on young people's ability to seek jobs, equal treatment for male and female employees, entrepreneurship and job creation, she said.

The Yogyakarta convention on youth employment is the second of its kind in Indonesia. The first was held on Oct. 13 and Oct. 14, in Surabaya, East Java.

Indonesia recorded a total 6.1 million young unemployed in 2001, or some 76 percent of the country's total unemployed. Meanwhile, according to an ILO estimate, youth unemployment worldwide has reached as much as 41 percent of the world's total unemployment, or some 74 million unemployed young people.

"We have to seek new opportunities for proper and productive jobs for the young. Otherwise, more young people will not be able to make best use of their own potential," said ILO Director Alan Boulton, quoted in a media release made available to The Jakarta Post on Wednesday. -- JP