Turkish newspaper Hurriyet's columnist Erdal Saglam comments on a United Nations report about the situation of the young people in Turkey which was published in March.

'The youngs have hardships' - 20 / 05 / 2008 12:45

The report, announced by the United Nations in March, was fortunately on the agenda due to May 19, Youth and Sports Day. This way, we remembered our responsibilities for the young people again.

 In sum, everybody should leave aside current political discussions and place more importance on the education.

According to the census in 2007, there are more than 12 million young people aged between 15 and 24 in Turkey, which equals 17.6 percent of the total population. These people who are the subject of the report suffer great problems and hardships.

The unemployment rate for these people is 17-18 percent, that is, two folds of the general unemployment rate in the entire country. Nearly 40 percent of the young people, in other words, 5 million people, are idle. They neither attend school, nor work.

 In addition, there aren't sufficient efforts to combat sexual discrimination, which frustrates the women's expectations for the future.

The report says that the most favorable old/young rates to be observed in upcoming decades might offer opportunities for government or create difficulties as well.

A window of opportunity of 15 years awaits Turkey to prepare today's young people for future struggles.

 In 15 years, nearly 70 percent of the Turkish population will be in working age, which will continue to increase until 2040.

This transformation would occur, if the rate of population decreases and the people in working age increases, and this is called the 'demographic opportunity window.'

Such a concept is a unique one which can be seized once in a world's history. The report says that if Turkey can create right opportunities for its young people and invests in their education to prepare them for future's high-yield business positions, it would use its demographic opportunity window effectively.

But if this opportunity is managed badly, the country might suffer unemployment, poverty and social anxiety greatly.

This determination shows that unless the current situation is well-managed, this might cause a disaster, otherwise it would cause a great opportunity for the country. We should focus on education immediately, because if we are late, we would face a disaster.

If we can't establish a comprehensive system to educate qualified manpower and continue with the present system, we would be doing the worst wrong to our young people.

According to the UN's report, a mutual interaction and cooperation should be ensured between vocational and technical schools and industrial and service organizations in the private sector.

This way a lot of young people could chose a profession which is beneficial to him/her and thus decrease the build-up in front of universities' doors.

Thus universities could become more qualified organizations and ensure the education of more qualified manpower.

Turkey's European Union bid should be evaluated as part of this. If this educational move can be realized, there would be no problem of unemployment, Turkey would enter the EU actually with its qualified manpower and thus our efficiency in Europe would grow in every respect.

Otherwise, we would be considered a dangerous country which shouldn't be approached by the EU and all other groups of countries.

Politicians should fulfill their responsibilities for the children and young people and use scientific methods, not dogmatic ones towards this end.