Policy Recommendations for Korea’s Vocational Education and Training (VET) Assistance to Tackle Youth Unemployment in Developing Countries

There are 1.2 billion youths (population aged between 15 and 24 years old) in the world, constituting 17 percent of the world’s population. With the increase in youth unemployment around the world, many countries have turned to Vocational Education and Training (VET) as a possible policy solution, both domestically and as part of their development assistance strategy. Unfortunately, the VET systems in many developing countries have critical problems such as the lack of funding, low quality of the training programs, and lack of coordination between different government ministries.

During the past few decades, the Republic of Korea (henceforth “Korea”) has supported numerous VET projects in developing countries. However, there are several problems with Korea’s VET assistance policies. This paper examines four policy options: 1) status-quo, 2) ALMP, 3) Career guidance, and 4) training in informal sector to improve the effectiveness of Korea’s VET assistance in addressing youth unemployment.