Pragramatic Youth Unemployment Solutions needed in Philippines

Last year i visited Manila in the Philippines as a youth delegate for the Global Forum on Migration and Development.

During my one week stay it was obvious to see young adolescents engaged in prostitution. I began to question some of Philippinos whether prostitution has been legalized in the Philippines and the feedback was "no!"

I think the Philippines government will need to do more to tackle the youth unemployment situation to solve this crises and also empower young females. As some people told me when i asked them the reason why there is so much prostitution in Manila, they mentioned that there are less job opportunities for young people.

I think mere negligence of responsibilities like this has a wild rippling effect as in cases of high rate of HIV/AIDS cases and increase gender inequality just to mention a few. In this case no amount of migrant remittances can solve or cure diseases like HIV/AIDS if the government does not take pragmatic steps to solve this issue despite the fact that the Philippines is one of the world's leading recipient of migrant remittances.

In Ghana we have a saying that if you empower a woman you empower the nation but if you empower a man then you have just empowered an individual. This analogy connects with the fact that adolescents who will grow into womanhood sometime to come will be the likely people to stay for longer hours with children at home as compared to men. Thus they are likely to agents of change for both male children and females children.

Gobal Cooperation: needed more than ever before

In the recent weeks a lot of topical issues have arisen that relate to migration and development. The G20 Summit, the lost of hundreds of lives of immigrants which were fear dead off the cost of Libya and the announcement by CNN that in United States, 5.1 million jobs have now been lost since the beginning of 2008.

The job loss in the USA seems to be a huge proportion of the 20 million migrants that will lose their jobs in host countries as predicted by the ILO last year among the about 200 million international migrants worldwide. Indeed the world is on a recession. The world needs cooperation for development never than before. I still feel uncomfortable of the fact that in the wake of the financial crisis countries like Russia is reflecting a rising protectionist sentiment in the global economy. However I liked Gordon Brown's closing remark statement that they can not stand to watch the poor countries suffer in times like this. The G20 leaders have committed to make an additional $1.1 trillion available to help the world economy through the crisis and to restore credit, growth and jobs. Let’s hope these moves from rhetoric’s to action. See: http://www.number10.gov.uk/Page18914 for more information on the G 2O Summit and the story of the irregular migrants from: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7973322.stm

My deepest sympathy for the hundreds of irregular migrants from Africa who lost their lives off the coast of Libya in trying to find a haven somewhere. I think that African governments will need to work hard to save the millions of lives that are lost on the high seas through irregular migration.

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