Showing posts from category South Sudan.
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Three New Reports Highlight Ongoing Significance of Youth Demographics in Global Trends
›January 2, 2012 // By Elizabeth Leahy MadsenAmidst world population reaching seven billion and last year’s Arab Spring, which in some nations is continuing into this winter, it can be easy to miss emerging pieces of research that tell us something relatively objective about youth and instability. Three new studies give practitioners and policymakers a stronger foundation of evidence to highlight the challenges and opportunities facing the world’s largest generation of young people.
Results of a recent UNICEF staff survey indicate that the people responsible for the UN’s efforts targeting children and youth are seriously concerned about demographic and economic dynamics. Asked to review a list of 20 “global trends,” UNICEF staff rated “growing disparities” and “youth bulge and youth unemployment” as the most significant to children. The results, which the agency will soon publish in a paper on “The Next Generation and Global Trends,” also indicate that staff members feel that UNICEF has a strong capacity to influence the future of these trends.
UNICEF’s recent “Child Outlook” report on global trends discusses the issues highlighted in the survey. The report notes that although many countries are moving toward middle-income status, poverty rates remain stubbornly high, indicating that economic development does not benefit all equally. Income and consumption in such countries tend to be concentrated among the wealthiest households. “While many families will prosper, others are being left behind,” the report explains.
“Tensions and discouragement arising from youth unemployment, combined with higher food prices and fiscal contractions, may have contributed to increased civil unrest, protests, and political instability,” UNICEF asserts. In many developing countries, the number of young people entering the labor market far surpasses the number of available jobs. Although some youth are not working because they are enrolled in secondary or tertiary education, low rates of youth participation in the workforce often are not a matter of choice. Young people, especially those with low levels of education and from poorer families, are often unable to find secure, decent jobs. More than one-quarter of all young people with jobs worldwide live below the poverty line of $1.25 per day.
Economic Pressures on Youth in East Africa
Two other research projects – one published, one still underway – provide additional context to the combination of demographic and economic challenges that face the world’s young people. In the first, part of a recent special U.S. Institute of Peace series on South Sudan, Stephanie Schwartz and Wilson Center fellow Marc Sommers probe the expectations of and obstacles faced by youth in the newly created country.
According to the incipient government’s statistics agency, 72 percent of South Sudan’s population is younger than 30, which places it among the 20 youngest age structures in the world. Only 40 percent of youth ages 15 to 24 are literate, and nearly 80 percent of households depend on agriculture for their income. Based on interviews conducted with urban and rural youth in three areas of South Sudan, the authors find that the pressure of paying rising dowry costs is the most salient issue facing young men, while young women are treated as economic assets with no influence in their own future. The authors’ research suggests that “some young men join armed gangs, at least in part, because they believe it will help them pay dowries.”
Although many young people in South Sudan aspire to the stability of government work, the limited number of jobs and shortage of relevant skills inhibit their aspirations. With an underdeveloped private sector, few opportunities for training, and nepotistic practices in hiring, there is little work for those living in towns and urban areas beyond manual labor and selling goods. The authors recommend that education and job training be expanded, with a focus on equitable access among young people from varied geographic backgrounds.
Across the border in northern Uganda, Chris Blattman, an associate professor of political science at Yale, has been studying the social effects of the government’s youth employment program started in 2007. The program offered grants to small groups of young people for vocational training or to fund the costs of starting a new business. Although a full paper has not yet been published, preliminary findings indicate strong economic benefits of the program which in turn improve social cohesion and community participation while diminishing aggression and “disputes with authorities” among young men. If they bear out, the results may well confirm the oft-repeated policy recommendation that focusing on youth employment is critical to improving national development as well as reducing the likelihood of instability and conflict.
In the year of seven billion, we heard much about the need to invest in young people and the tremendous potential they embody, for demographic dividends as well as overall development. Yet 2011 was also a year of tremendous upheaval, much of which was driven by young people – and their older counterparts – seeking representative and democratic governance. This should serve as a reminder that youth can be a remarkable force for positive change, but in too many places – South Sudan among them – their opportunities, prospects, and contributions are constrained. As the UNICEF survey results reiterate how important this issue is to development programming, the Uganda research may be another important piece of evidence that direct investment in young people reaps tangible results not only for them, but also for society.
Elizabeth Leahy Madsen is a consultant on political demography for the Wilson Center’s Environmental Change and Security Program and senior technical advisor at Futures Group. She was previously a senior research associate at Population Action International.
Sources: Bill and Melinda Gates Institute for Population and Reproductive Health, Chris Blattman, ILO, Sommers and Schwartz (2011), South Sudan National Bureau of Statistics, UNICEF, World Bank.
Photo Credit: “UNAMID Peacekeeper Speaks with Sudanese Youth,” courtesy of UN Photo/Albert Gonzalez Farran. -
Tracking the End Game: Sudan’s Comprehensive Peace Agreement
›The next nine months are critical for Sudan. The 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) sets January 9, 2011, as the date when southern Sudanese will vote on secession or unity, and the people of disputed Abeyei will vote on whether to be part of North or South Sudan. Between now and July 2011, when the provisions of the CPA come to an end, we could see the birth of the new country of South Sudan—or a return to a North-South war if the referendum is stalled, botched, or disputed. (Few currently expect that a unity vote will create the “New Sudan” envisioned by the late John Garang.)
Much remains unclear. The Referendum Commission for South Sudan is behind schedule and its work so far has been marred by disputes between members. Assuming the referendum does occur, while most commentators expect the vote to be for secession, it is not clear what will happen after the votes are counted.
Like Oil and Water
Since the summer, the National Congress Party (NCP) and Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) working groups, with facilitation by the African Union, have been looking at key issues such as citizenship, security arrangements, international legal issues, and economic and natural resource issues, including oil, debts and assets, and water. However, no agreements have yet been reached.
The economies of North and South Sudan are entwined, particularly through oil, which is found predominantly (but not only) in the south. Oil is refined and exported from northern facilities in Khartoum and on the Red Sea. If South Sudan secedes, arrangements allowing for the free movement of people, goods—including oil—and capital between the two new states could create a “win–win” outcome for all.
In addition, if the referendum is credible and peaceful, both countries would enjoy considerable opportunities to increase the size of the shared “economic pie,” through new private-sector investment, particularly in oil, minerals, and large-scale agriculture.
Sudan is only beginning to tap its mineral and hydrocarbon reserves. Given the limited exploration to date, no one knows how big a producer of oil and minerals it will become, making the troubled state potentially an important strategic player for the global East as much as the West.
Sudan’s largest foreign investor, China, has provided diplomatic support to Khartoum and military aid, but although the PRC has gone on record as being in favor of a united Sudan, I question whether they would be willing to risk the tremendous amount of infrastructure investments they have made in another shooting war. In the last months, China has opened up a consulate in Juba and extended its contacts in the South.
What Comes Next?
Given the potential impact of instability on the troubled Great Lakes region to the south and the Horn of Africa to the east, the international community is anxiously awaiting the referendum, in hopes that it will go a long way towards stabilizing one of the world’s most troubled hotspots, instead of plunging it back into conflict.
No one knows if the political leaders, and the people of North and South, will take the bold actions needed to make this happen. Key developments that will indicate progress towards a peaceful solution include:- Are voter rolls, polling arrangements, and election monitoring being put into place? Will there be external support to ensure the referendum goes well?
- Are the leaders of the NCP and the SPLM making joint (or at least matching) statements committing to a free and fair referendum and to good-faith implementation of its outcome?
- Are politicians publicly supporting the referendum process, and explaining what the referendum will mean for them and their communities?
- Are leaders from South Sudan making their public aware that even after secession, friendly and constructive relations with the North will be necessary and desirable?
- Are politicians from North Sudan providing their public with a road map for a changed country after the referendum, whatever the results?
- Is the international community – including the United States, China, and the other key states – singing from the same song sheet, loudly and often, publicly and privately, to encourage Sudan’s politicians to hold the referendum, run it fairly and implement the results in a collaborative and constructive way?
- Are framework agreements being reached on oil, citizenship, debts and assets, and other key issues?
- Are the remaining border issues being resolved?
- Are the two governments and the oil companies (which generate most of Sudan’s government revenues and export earnings), working together to ensure that oil production and export – and hence government revenues – continue unabated through the referendum period?
- Increased militarization of the border;
- Increased border skirmishes;
- A racheting-up of hostile rhetoric from leaders and in the media;
- Fissures in the international community that weaken pressure on the parties to complete CPA implementation through a full referendum process; and/or
- Loss of political control by either the NCP or the SPLM (or both).
- Keep focus on the issue: Build a noisy and active consensus around the importance of a free and fair referendum and full implementation of the outcome, whatever it is.
- Offer incentives and make credible threats to both parties to encourage this final step in implementing the CPA.
- Work on a “Plan B” that includes contingencies for a return to war, a humanitarian emergency (such as a mass movement of people south, or even repudiation of the CPA altogether.
Jill Shankleman is a Senior Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center, with expertise in oil, gas and mining industries in developing countries, revenue management, the social and environmental impacts of oil, and Chinese extractive industry companies.
Sources: Energy Information Agency, Greenbelt Movement, Sudan Tribune, UN, Voice of America.
Photo Credit: Adapted from “Sudan,” courtesy of flickr user sdhaddow.
