New Egypt Human Development Report Addresses The Role of Youth in Egypt's Future
The 2010 Egypt Human Development Report (EHDR) has been released and focuses specifically on the importance of youth in Egypt's economic, social and political development. The report, "Youth in Egypt: Building our Future", features a chapter by MEYI nonresident senior fellow Ragui Assaad on human development and labor markets, which investigates transitions into employment for Egyptian youth as well as the skills gap between education and employment and the occupational outlook facing young people today. Djavad Salehi-Isfahani, also a MEYI fellow, served on the report's review committee and Ehaab Abdou, MEYI Advisor, provided input at various stages of the report’s development. The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) has published the Egypt Human Development Report regularly since 1994, with each year's report addressing a distinct theme. In 2008, the report focused on the role of civil society as partners in advancing Egypt's new social contract.
The latest report investigates the main difficulties and constraints facing Egyptian youth and identifies nine areas of action to improve youth prospects. One of the primary difficulties highlighted by the report is the “waithood” phenomenon, which is the prolonged period during which young people simply wait for their lives to begin, queuing for long periods of unemployment during which they live with their parents and are financially unable to pursue marriage or home ownership.
In a MEYI interview, lead author Heba Handoussa discusses the report's four central themes: the quality of public service provision for youth, including education, health, housing, and information and communications technology (ICT); the economic environment, including employment and the labor market, entrepreneurship, and vocational training; the social- cultural environment, including values, poverty, and gender-based exclusion; and the political-institutional environment, including political participation, volunteerism, and governance.
