In the complex whirlwind of challenges facing Morocco, school dropout among young people occupies a crucial place. An observation, recently studied by the Economic, Social and Environmental Council (CESE) which presented, this Wednesday, May 8, 2024, its opinion called “Young NEETs: What prospects for socio-economic inclusion”. However, this Thursday at the plenary session devoted to the discussion of the progress report on government action in the Chamber of Advisors, the head of government, Aziz Akhannouch, expressed, reservations regarding the effectiveness of the proposed solutions, recalling that Morocco is interested in the potential of young people.
According to Ahmed Réda Chami, president of the EESC, the number of young people NEET (neither in employment, education nor training) is at least 1.5 million. Forming a vulnerable cohort hindering national progress, this category must regain the government’s interest by putting in place targeted initiatives to offer them promising horizons, according to the council.
In his intervention, Aziz Akhannouch took the opportunity to qualify the conclusions of the opinion presented by the EESC.
“These challenges are not new, and I want to emphasize that the government is fully aware of the situation. The figures that we have before our eyes, in particular the 4 million young people who leave training and school, are realities that we have identified for a long time.», affirmed the head of the Executive.
However, for Aziz Akhannouch, it is time to take action and propose concrete solutions. “I have carefully examined the proposals from the EESC, but I must admit that I do not find them convincing. As a government, we have already undertaken reforms in the field of education to reduce school dropouts and to include young people in the economic framework.“.
For its part, the Council concisely observed that certain public policies target young people, but that they are neither integrated nor easily accessible to all. An observation contested by the head of government arguing that the executive is making indisputable efforts to remedy this problem and continues to do so.
“We aim to ensure that a third of children affected by this phenomenon are no longer affected. To achieve this, we are focusing our efforts on several fronts. We improve access to school transportation, we strengthen academic support, we offer enriching extracurricular activities and we encourage the creation of schools of excellence“, he said.
In addition, the second chance school project is at the heart of government concerns. In this sense, Akhannouch indicated: “this year we opened 16 new centers and the number of beneficiaries increased by 10%, reaching 80,00 young people. We are making commendable efforts to reduce social and spatial disparities, in particular by promoting the education of girls in rural areas.“.
In addition, the head of government reviewed the opportunities presented by the digital sphere, “we are investing massively in the digital sector to make it an engine for job creation. Our goal is to train 100,000 young people in this field and employ 240,000 young people in the digital sector in the future. We have launched initiatives such as Forsa and Awrach to boost employment, especially in times of crisis and stagnation imposed by the Covid-19 pandemic“.
For the EESC, communication is the Achilles heel of these programs which are not accessible to everyone. In response, Aziz Akhannouch emphasizes that “the Forsa program benefited 21,000 cooperatives chosen from 300,000 applications. These figures demonstrate the effectiveness of our programs, and which demonstrate the strength of communication within our actions.“.
