Job scarcity hampers poverty alleviation effort - ministers say

African labour and social affairs ministers have urged heads of states to show personal commitment to addressing the challenges of employment promotion and poverty alleviation on the continent and place them at the centre of their socioeconomic policies.

The appeal was contained in a declaration issued by the 25th session of the OAU Labour and Social Affairs Commission, held in Ouagadougou from 16 to 21 April. [The session comprised a group of experts meeting on 16-19 April, followed by a ministerial meeting on 20-21 April.]

Some 400 delegates, including labour and social affairs ministers, trade unionists, employers, representatives of employers' and civil society organisations and ILO experts attended the meetings whose theme was, 'Employment and poverty alleviation in Africa'.

The meeting stressed the need to explore ways to generate more jobs as a way to reduce poverty in Africa, where the number of people of working age increases by 2.9 percent each year.

"The reality is that we are not going to get out of poverty if we do not create jobs and avenues for revenues," ILO Director-General Juan Somavia told the meeting. He said he regretted the fact that cooperation between African countries and international organisations that seek to work against poverty did not include plans to create enterprises and jobs.

Each year some 8.7 million young people enter the job market in Africa but few find jobs, according to the UN Economic Commission for Africa. UNDP notes in its latest Human Development Report that 43 percent of Africa's urban population and 59 percent of people in rural areas live in extreme poverty. Between 1998 and 1999, the report says, the number of poor people in Africa increased from 291 million to 310 million.

"The permanence of the labour crisis hampers the possibility (of the continent) to play its strategic role in the economic and social development and to be a key factor in the combat against poverty and social exclusion rampant on the continent," Ablasse Ouedraogo, deputy director general of the World Trade Organisation, told the meeting.

The meeting acknowledged the failure of Africa's public sector to absorb the growing number of jobless people while states suffered under structural adjustment programmes.

Participants saw the New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD) as a strong alternative to help meet the continent's employment needs through private sector development. They urged all member states to "undertake consultations with social partners at national and regional levels as soon as possible" so that the results can be transmitted to OAU heads of states at a special session of the Commission to be held at this year's international labour conference in June in Geneva.