On October 13th, the Seminar “Youth Talent and Perspectives on the Future of Work” was developed in Santiago de Chile.  

In Chile, as in the rest of Latin America, the youth unemployment outlook is rather complex. Recently, OECD figures showed that 18.8% of young people in Chile are neither in employment, education, or training (NEETs). 24.6% of them are women and 12.8% men. Even though these figures are below the regional average, they still are above the global average.

In this context, Adecco Chile and GAN4Youth, the Global Apprenticeship Network, developed the seminar “Youth Talent and Perspectives on the Future of Work”, which led to a top level debate about the promotion of youth employment and the different practices that companies and organizations are implementing to enhance young people’s access to the labour market.

Important personalities from the Latin American and Chilean labour world attended the event. A few examples include: Alain Dehaze, Global CEO Adecco Group and  President of GAN; Francisco Javier Díaz, Deputy Secretary of Labour,  Pedro Goic, National Director of Sence; Lorenzo Pelaez, ILO specialist and Martín Padulla, Founder and Director of staffingamericalatina.

“Due to the lack employment expectations, lots of youngsters lose interest in completing their education, and have little incentives to find a job. This situation places them in a position of high risk of social exclusion and inequality”, said Alain Dehaze, Global CEO of Adecco Group, who visited Chile and took part of the event as the President of GAN4Youth.

He also underlined that “40% of employers regret not finding candidates with the profile and skills they demand”, which “shows the gap that exists between the professionals we are training and the profiles that companies demand.”

A report presented by Adecco states that youth employment informality in Chile is close to 15%, according to OECD data. Even though the rate is rather low in comparison to other countries in the region, it still is an alarming figure, particularly when reviewing different sectors of the economy. For example, a large number of youngsters work as housekeepers, a sector with informality rates of 40.3%.

Martín Padulla, Founder and Director of staffingamericalatina, believes that “Chile has a major opportunity if it improves skills’ training based on demand, and if it manages to articulate public employment services with private employment services. This way, the country would increase its efficiency in training, as well as in labour intermediation for young people. In order to achieve these goals, it should ratify ILO’s Convention No. 181 on Private Employment Agencies”.

“In order to create a more modern, dynamic and inclusive labour market, it is key that every social actor linked to education and labour pledges to this cause”, concluded Francisco Martínez, General Director of Adecco Chile.