The employment agenda
Job creation has remained top of the government’s agenda since 2010 when Uganda started implementing her Vision 2040, delivered through six 5-year National Development Plans (NDPs). Since then, the government has launched various interventions to foster job creation. By August 2020, it had invested over UGX 400 billion in the Youth Venture Capital Fund (YVCF), Youth Livelihood Programme (YLP) and Uganda Women Entrepreneurship Program (UWEP)[1] as shown in Figure 1. Additionally, the government launched other Presidential initiatives for wealth and job creation, such as Emyooga in August 2019 and the Parish Development Model (PDM) in February 2022, which have already received UGX 268 billion and UGX 1.126 trillion as of May 2024, respectively. Like the past interventions, the PDM and Emyooga are envisaged to create many jobs for Ugandans.
Figure 1: Cumulative funding for YVCF, YLP and UWEP (billion)
Source: Author’s construction using data from the Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development (MGLSD)
Besides livelihood interventions, the Government implemented the Business, Technical and Vocational Education and Training (BTVET) Strategic Plan 2011-2020, also known as the Skilling Uganda programme, which was deemed to be a magic bullet to acute unemployment in Uganda, with ambitious targets like 70 percent of employers satisfied with competencies of BTVET graduates by 2020; and 80 percent of BTVET graduates entering the labour market finding employment. The Technical Vocational Education and Training (TVET) Policy was enacted in 2019.
The issue of concern
Despite the various efforts made by the government, both financial and policy-wise, unemployment remains a big challenge and of concern to government and Ugandans at large. In 2020, the National Planning Authority indicated that out of the estimated 700,000 that join the labour market annually, only about 238,000 (34 percent) find jobs. With over 70 percent of the Ugandan population below 30 years (Figure 2), as revealed by the preliminary results of the recently released 2024 national census, the potential labour joining the workforce in the coming years may overwhelm the labour market and worsen the unemployment crisis.
Figure 3: Age – Sex Composition of Uganda’s Population
Source: UBOS 2024
Most notably, employment interventions have suffered several challenges ranging from insufficient funding and budget cuts to corruption by some government officials. Nonetheless, a critical comparison between resources pumped into employment interventions and jobs reported to have been created raises scepticism about the effectiveness of such interventions in tackling the unemployment challenge in Uganda.
The solution
Given the constrained fiscal space, it is more critical than ever for the Government to adopt pro-employment budgeting. This approach calls for integrating an employment perspective in the planning and budgeting. All relevant government ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) and local governments prioritise employment and allocate and spend funds to promote employment creation rather than creating separate budgets for employment interventions. The approach stems from the recognition that employment is a cross-cutting issue, and thus, job creation should be a shared responsibility of all MDAs and local governments.
To achieve pro-employment budgeting, the following conditions should be satisfied:
- Employment promotion should be a priority issue in preparing the policies and budgets of MDAs and local governments.
- The Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development (MoFPED) should consider employment promotion as a criterion when deciding on the allocation of funds to different MDAs and programmes.
- The budget-related reports of MDAs and local governments, and all activities funded by government agencies should include indicators related to employment creation.
- Given that MoFPED has control over the allocation of funds, it is better positioned to compel MDAs and local governments to adopt pro-employment budgeting and thus should lead the efforts.
- The Ministry of Gender, Labour and Development (MoGLSD), which has a mandate of employment promotion, should closely work with MoFPED to set employment targets for MDAs and local governments and evaluate their performance. Strong coordination between MoFPED and MoGLSD is critical for pro-employment budgeting to be successful.
This way, different MDAs and local governments would create millions of jobs each financial year. The pro-employment budgeting approach has already been adopted in Tanzania and China, demonstrating the potential to generate vast jobs.