INDIA: Students connect with employers at job fair
Don Bosco Job Placement Network of India holds job fair for 1,200 young adults
INDIA
(MissionNewswire) A job fair organized by the Don Bosco Job Placement Network of India, held at Nirmala College for Women, was attended by 1,200 young adults. The job fair featured 36 companies who are hiring in Coimbatore, a city in the south Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Youth had an opportunity to find job placement in a range of careers including as financial analysts, software engineers, sales executives and hotel managers.
The initiative was spearheaded by Father Gabriel, assistant director of Don Bosco Job Placement Network of India, in collaboration with Dr. Helen, a Salesian sister and principal of Nirmala College for Women, and Salesians who oversee job placement services in Trichy and Coimbatore.
Don Bosco Job Placement Network of India has been helping poor and marginalized rural youth find jobs since 1996. The organization is used by skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled workers across Indian provinces. In the southern provinces of Chennai, Trichy, Hyderabad and Bangalore, there are offices located throughout with their own staff and local business connections.
“This job fair was an exciting opportunity for youth to meet and connect with local employers who are hiring in their field of study,” said Father Gus Baek, director of Salesian Missions, the U.S. development arm of the Salesians of Don Bosco. “Salesian colleges and technical and vocational programs help to train youth in fields that are hiring so youth can make an easier transition from the classroom to the workforce.”
Access to professional training and workforce development services is highly valued by youth in India. The country, which is home to 1.34 billion people (18 percent of the world’s population), will have overtaken China as the world’s most populous country by 2024, according to the World Economic Forum. While India has the world’s largest youth population, it has yet to capitalize on this, leaving some 30 percent of this population without employment, education or training.
India has the world’s fourth largest economy but more than 22 percent of the country lives in poverty. About 31 percent of the world’s multidimensionally poor children live in India, according to a report by the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative.
India’s youth face a lack of educational opportunities due to issues of caste, class and gender. Almost 44 percent of the workforce is illiterate and less than 10 percent of the working-age population has completed a secondary education. In addition, many secondary school graduates do not have the knowledge and skills to compete in today’s changing job market.
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Sources:
Photo courtesy of Don Bosco India
ANS – 1200 Young Job Seekers Attend Mega Job Fair
Don Bosco Job Placement Network of India
Salesian Missions – India
World Bank – India
