India has the most unemployable population: Report

India has the largest, youngest population in the world. But it is also the most unemployable population as it lacks work skills that can make it employable.

According to a survey conducted by FICCI-Ernst & Young Paper, even though over 40 million people are registered in employment exchanges, only 0.2 million get jobs annually. Even startling is the fact that about 80% of the Indian workforce does not possess identifiable marketable skills. Equally sad is the fact that the school dropout rate in India touches 56.8% by the time students reach the qualifying examination at the 10th standard which further leads to unemployability.

The survey found that only 25% of the Indian professionals are considered “employable” by multinationals and the difficulty of employers in India to fill job vacancies has increased to 67%in 2011 compared with 16% in last year.

It is estimated that over 75% of the new jobs to be created in India will be ‘skill-based.’ While the country’s overall supply of highly skilled labour marginally exceeds demand, there is a shortage of adequately qualified (or employable) people. The study said this was primarily due to the fact that the Indian training institutions are heterogeneous in nature varying in quality of education and training provided by them.

There is also lack of focus on development of skills pertaining to the specific requirement of employers. And, there is non-recognition of the value of skilled workers by employers, particularly in the small enterprise sectors.

The report said India has many lessons to learn from international practices. Germany has 75% and the UK has 68% skilled work force compared to India which account for only 2%. It said, thus, far-reaching and deep rooted reforms were needed to emulate countries whose vocational education and training systems has been successful.

Last year, another study by FICCI had pointed out that fresh graduates who posses “soft skills” and have vocational training besides the factual knowledge provided by certification programs find jobs much more easily than to those who lack them. The survey had claimed that there was a severe crunch of good manpower in the corporate sector and only 30% employers and top bosses expressed satisfaction with the new graduates they had hired indicating fresh graduates needed to posses more than just a degree.

“60%of India’s 1.2 billion people are in the working age group. However, only 10% of the 300 million children in India between the age of 6 and 16 will pass school and go beyond. Only 5%of India’s labour force in the age group 19-24 years is estimated to have acquired formal training,” said S. Ramadorai, advisor to the Prime Minister in National Skill Development Council.

Understanding the issues, the government has already started reworking its vocational education framework to be more competitive and acceptable to the world market. Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal said that since there was an acute shortage of labour at Tier 2 and Tier 3. It is anticipated that by 2020, about 220 million students will pass out from school, out of which, about 150 million will not enroll for college education.

“This young talent needs to be motivated for vocational education,” Sibal said.