Digital Jobs for Youth: Young Women in the Digital Economy Solutions for Youth Employment September 2018 Co-authors: Case Study Contributors: Financial Support Provided by: Digital Jobs for Youth: Young Women in the Digital Economy SEPTEMBER 2018 © 2018 International Bank for Reconstruction and Development / The World Bank 1818 H Street NW Washington, DC 20433 Telephone: 202-473-1000 Internet: www.worldbank.org The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this work do not necessarily reflect the views of the Executive Directors of The World Bank or the governments they represent. The World Bank does not guarantee the accuracy of the data included in this work. The boundaries, colors, denominations, and other information shown on any map in this work do not imply any judgment on the part of The World Bank concerning the legal status of any territory or the endorsement or acceptance of such boundaries. 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Cover Photo: © Visual News Associates / World Bank (Hyderabad, Pakistan) Table of Contents Boxes, Figures and Tables .............................................................................................................................. i Acknowledgements...................................................................................................................................... iii Abbreviations ........................................................................................................................................... iv Foreword ............................................................................................................................................ v 1. Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Purpose ............................................................................................................................... 1 1.2 Audience ............................................................................................................................. 1 1.3 Contributing Partners ......................................................................................................... 2 1.4 Report Structure ................................................................................................................. 2 2. Youth in the Digital Economy........................................................................................................... 4 2.1 Youth Employment: A Global Priority ................................................................................. 4 2.2 The Digital Economy ........................................................................................................... 7 2.3 Why Focus on Young Women? ......................................................................................... 10 3. An Integrated Framework for Digital Jobs ..................................................................................... 12 3.1 The Demand-Side: Drivers of Demand for Digital Jobs..................................................... 12 3.2 Drivers of Demand in Digital Employment ....................................................................... 19 3.3 Stimulating Digital Job Creation........................................................................................ 31 3.4 The Supply-side: Building Digital Skills .............................................................................. 34 4. Young Women and the Digital Economy ....................................................................................... 38 4.1 Gender Digital Divide ........................................................................................................ 38 4.2 Barriers to Digital Employment for Young Women .......................................................... 39 4.3 New Opportunities for Young Women ............................................................................. 43 5. Promising Practices for Gender-Inclusive Digital Jobs Programs for Youth .................................. 46 5.1 Program Insights ............................................................................................................... 46 5.2 Understanding Context and Diagnosing Constraints ........................................................ 52 5.3 Program Design Components: Supply-Side Interventions ................................................ 55 5.4 Program Design Components: Demand-Side Interventions ............................................. 73 6. Conclusion: Closing the Gender Digital Divide............................................................................... 79 6.1 The Role of the Government ............................................................................................ 79 6.2 The Role of the Private Sector .......................................................................................... 87 6.3 Conclusion......................................................................................................................... 90 Bibliography .......................................................................................................................................... 93 Annex A: Case Study Guidelines & Template............................................................................................ 104 Annex B: Case Studies ............................................................................................................................... 113 #eSkills4Girls ................................................................................................................................ 114 African Centre for Women in Information and Communications Technology (ACWICT) ........... 120 Caribbean Mobile Innovation Project (CMIP) .............................................................................. 126 CloudFactory ................................................................................................................................ 132 Compete – Young Professionals Program.................................................................................... 136 Digital Divide Data (DDD) ............................................................................................................. 142 Digital Jobs for KP......................................................................................................................... 147 Empowering Women through E-Governance.............................................................................. 156 EOH Youth Job Creation Initiative................................................................................................ 160 Friends of the British Council ....................................................................................................... 166 Girls Who Code ............................................................................................................................ 172 Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator ................................................................................. 181 Laboratoria................................................................................................................................... 187 Maharishi Institute....................................................................................................................... 195 Saksham ....................................................................................................................................... 199 Samasource .................................................................................................................................. 206 Training for the Future ................................................................................................................. 213 Women in Online Work (WoW) Pilot........................................................................................... 223 The Youth Banner ........................................................................................................................ 230 Annex C: List of External Digital Jobs Programs, Platforms & Initiatives .................................................. 235 Annex D: Online Consultations Report ..................................................................................................... 241 Boxes, Figures and Tables BOXES Box 3.1 What is Online Outsourcing?................................................................................................... 23 Box 3.2 What is Virtual Freelancing? ................................................................................................... 25 Box 3.3 What is Microwork? ................................................................................................................ 26 Box 3.4 Concerns about Online Outsourcing ....................................................................................... 27 Box 4.1 What is the Gender Digital Divide? ......................................................................................... 38 Box 4.2 Digital Jobs for Young Women with Disabilities ...................................................................... 45 Box 5.1 Online Consultations: Key Messages ....................................................................................... 49 Box 5.2 Digital Jobs for KP: An Integrated ApproAch to Digital Jobs ................................................... 51 Box 5.3 Laboratoria: Creating a Safe Space for Young Women ........................................................... 69 Box 5.4 #eskills4girls: Global Effort to Close Gender Digital Divide ..................................................... 78 Box 6.1 International Girls in ICT Day................................................................................................... 82 Box 6.2 Universal Service and Access Funds (USAFs)........................................................................... 83 Box 6.3 UN Foundation’s Data 2X Platform ......................................................................................... 84 Box 6.4 Fighting Gender Bias in the Workplace ................................................................................... 87 Box 6.5 EDGE Certification ................................................................................................................... 89 Box 6.6 GSMA’s Connected Women Program ..................................................................................... 90 FIGURES Figure 1.1 Barriers to LMICs’ Full Participation in the Digital Economy ..................................................... 7 Figure 1.2 Accenture’s ‘New Skills Now’ Taxonomy .................................................................................. 9 Figure 3.1 Types of Digital Work .............................................................................................................. 13 Figure 3.2 Types of Digital Skills ............................................................................................................... 14 Figure 3.3 Drivers of Demand for Digital Jobs .......................................................................................... 15 Figure 3.4 Share of Workers Using Digital Skills by Skill Level, Selected Countries ................................. 35 Figure 3.5 Share of Workers Using Digital Skills by Gender, Selected Countries ..................................... 36 Figure 3.6 Share of Workers Using Digital Skills By Sector, Selected Countries ...................................... 37 Figure 4.1 Barriers to Digital Employment for Young Women................................................................. 41 Figure 5.1 List of Case Studies .................................................................................................................. 47 TABLES Table 1.1 Youth Unemployment Rates and Labor Force Size ................................................................... 5 Table 1.2 Youth Working Poverty Rates ................................................................................................... 5 Table 3.1 Drivers of ICT-Intensive, ICT-Dependent and ICT-Enhanced Work ......................................... 17 Table 3.2 Current Opportunities for Digital Work, Selected Groups ...................................................... 33 Table 4.1 Constraints to Young Women’s Digital Employment .............................................................. 40 Table 6.1 Examples of Countries’ Efforts to Reduce the Gender Digital Divide ..................................... 86 Table 6.2 UNDP Gender Equality Seal Program, Country Examples ....................................................... 89 ii Acknowledgements This report was a collaborative effort of S4YE members led by Danielle Robinson (Gender & Digital Jobs Specialist, S4YE Secretariat) under the direction of Namita Datta (Coalition Manager, S4YE Secretariat). Report authors also include: Emily Massey, Tshegofatso Kgasago and Mishkah Jakoet (Genesis Analytics, funded by The Rockefeller Foundation); Peter Glick, Diana Gehlhaus Carew and Ifeanyi Edochie (RAND Corporation); and Delores McLaughlin and Andrew Small (Plan International). The following S4YE Secretariat team members led several components of the report: Branka Minic (Digital Jobs Advisor, S4YE Secretariat), Aude Schoentgen, Prachi Ganu and Utpala Menon. S4YE is grateful to current Chair of the Board of Directors, Mamadou Biteye (Managing Director, Africa Regional Office, The Rockefeller Foundation) for strategically guiding the focus of this report, and sharing learning from The Rockefeller Foundation’s Digital Jobs for Africa initiative. The authors also thanks Alvaro Gonzalez (Principal Economist, Jobs Group, World Bank) for his review and feedback. The authors received thoughtful comments from several peer reviewers, including Alicia Hammond (Gender Specialist, World Bank), Natalija Gelvanovska-Garcia (Regulatory Specialist, World Bank), Gabriela Pérez-Hobrecker (Manager, Accenture Strategy), Susan Schorr (Head, Digital Inclusion Division, International Telecommunication Union) and Niall O’Higgins (Senior Researcher, International Labour Organization). Siddhartha Raja (Senior ICT Policy Specialist, World Bank) and Samantha Watson (Operations Officer, World Bank) provided early research and feedback. Online consultations were led by Sonia Madhvani (Program Officer, World Bank) and Steve Commins (Consultant, World Bank). Adnan Siddiqi (Communications Specialist, S4YE Secretariat) provided valuable editorial and design support. The authors also thank Ayanna Samuels (Consultant, World Bank), Zhenia Viatchaninova Dalphond (Consultant, World Bank), and Shan Rehman (Social Development Specialist, World Bank) for their contributions. Several members of the S4YE coalition contributed case studies for this report, including Accenture, the Government of Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), Microsoft, Plan International, The Rockefeller Foundation, and the World Bank. The US Agency for International Development (USAID) also provided a case study. The authors thank the program staff and youth beneficiaries who graciously shared information on their experiences. The authors are grateful to the youth beneficiaries and program staff of Digital Data Divide, Educate!, Giraal Africa, Google’s Womenwill Initiative, Impact Partner, Laboratoria, My Green World, Samasource Digital Basics, Uwazi, and the World Bank for providing valuable insights during the online consultations. The authors also thank Accenture, Educate!, Mastercard Foundation, International Youth Foundation, Restless Development, and the World Bank for connecting us with these organizations. The contributions of Peter Glick, Diana Carew and Ifeanyi Edochie were made possible through the support of the Pardee Initiative for Global Human Progress at the Pardee RAND Graduate School. S4YE is grateful to the Mastercard Foundation for supporting Branka Minic’s contribution to this report. Finally, the publication of this report would not have been possible without the generosity of the World Bank’s Jobs Umbrella Trust Fund, which is supported by the Department for International Development/UK AID, and the Governments of Norway and Germany, the Austrian Development Agency, and the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency. The authors are grateful for their continued support. iii Abbreviations BPO: Business Process Outsourcing HIC: High-Income Country ICT: Information and Communication Technology IFC: International Finance Corporation ILO: International Labour Organization IT: Information Technology ITU: International Telecommunication Union LIC: Low-Income Country LDC: Least-Developed Country LMIC: Low- and Middle-Income Country MIC: Middle-Income Country NEET: Not in Employment, Education or Training NGO: Non-Governmental Organization OECD: Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development S4YE: Solutions for Youth Employment SDG: Sustainable Development Goal SME: Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprise STEM: Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics UN: United Nations UNICEF: United Nations Children's Fund USAID: United States Agency for International Development WBG: World Bank Group iv Foreword Technology is touted as both savior and saboteur of young people’s futures. It is capable of opening opportunities once undreamed of by helping young people to transcend the physical, social, and economic barriers that stand between them and a decent job. At the same time, advances in automation and artificial intelligence could combine to see two thirds of workers worldwide replaced by machines. The potential negative impact on young women, of this seismic shift in the global employment landscape, is alarming. They will feel the effects of automation more acutely, as young women already have lower labor force participation than men. Add this to an entrenched gender digital divide, and long-standing stereotypes and biases, and the cards quickly get stacked against a young woman trying to compete in a digital world of work. This is the setting for the 2018 S4YE annual flagship report Digital Jobs for Youth: Young Women in the Digital Economy. The report opens a window into the trends shaping digital work. It includes contributions and case studies from S4YE coalition members, drawing on evidence from peer organizations spanning five continents. It is a hugely valuable resource for policymakers and practitioners seeking to chart a course through the uncertain future of work and harness the potential of digital jobs to deliver on the international community’s promise of full and productive employment for all young people by 2030. The report also serves as a compelling call to action for the private sector, civil society, international organizations, and governments. To focus on the unique needs of girls and young women in a digital economy and to join forces to achieve inclusive digital employment for all. Because, without decisive action now, the global digital revolution might turn out to be a big backward step for global gender equality. Anne-Birgitte Albrectsen Chair (FY 2017-18), Board of Directors, Solutions for Youth Employment (S4YE)1 CEO, Plan International, Inc. 1 Anne-Birgitte Albrectsen served as Chair of S4YE’s Board of Directors during the period that this report was written. Per the Board’s practice of annual rotation, the current Chair is Mamadou Biteye, Managing Director, Africa Regional Office, The Rockefeller Foundation. v 1. Introduction Solutions for Youth Employment (S4YE) is a multi-stakeholder coalition among public sector, private sector, and civil society actors that aims to provide leadership and resources for catalytic action to increase the number of young people engaged in productive work. The S4YE coalition includes the World Bank, Accenture, The Rockefeller Foundation, Mastercard Foundation, Microsoft, Plan International, International Youth Foundation (IYF), Youth Business International (YBI), RAND Corporation, the International Labour Organization (ILO), the Governments of Norway, Germany, and the UN Envoy for Youth. More partners are likely to join soon. S4YE’s mission is to provide leadership and catalytic action and mobilize efforts to significantly increase the number of young people engaged in productive work by 2030, by developing innovative solutions to youth employment through practical research and active engagement with public and private stakeholders to enable solutions at scale. S4YE combines a pragmatic approach to identifying solutions for youth employment with an evidence-based advocacy platform to increase access to productive work for young people. 1.1 Purpose The Digital Jobs for Youth: Young Women in the Digital Economy flagship report is primarily intended to provide operational recommendations for the design and implementation of gender- inclusive digital jobs interventions for youth. Using a newly developed digital jobs typology, the report will identify drivers of demand across various categories of digital work. The report will then extract lessons learned in overcoming supply and demand‐side barriers to youth digital employment, based on past and ongoing programs implemented by S4YE coalition members. In doing so, the report will identify design elements and strategies that would be especially helpful in connecting young women to the digital economy. Finally, this report will provide recommendations for the design and implementation of gender-inclusive digital jobs programs for youth. Findings from this report are meant to provide inputs to the design and implementation of gender-focused digital job pilots to be launched by S4YE. 1.2 Audience This report is primarily targeted at practitioners who are involved in the design and implementation of youth employment programs. Insights from this report will also be valuable to private sector organizations, civil society organizations, international organizations and donors, and government agencies that are interested in exploring innovative ways to promote digital employment for youth, and women. 1.3 Contributing Organizations This report was a collaborative effort by S4YE member organizations. Lead authors represented Genesis Analytics (funded by The Rockefeller Foundation), Plan International, RAND Corporation and the S4YE Secretariat. Several members of the S4YE coalition also prepared case studies based on their experiences supporting, designing and implementing digital skills and digital jobs programs for youth, including Accenture, German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), Microsoft, Plan International, The Rockefeller Foundation, and the World Bank Group. The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) also prepared a case study.2 1.4 Report Structure This report is organized as follows: ▪ Chapter 1: Introduction o Lead: S4YE Secretariat o Provides an overview of the purpose, target audience, contributing partners and structure of the report. ▪ Chapter 2: Youth in the Digital Economy o Lead: Plan International, RAND Corporation, Genesis Analytics o Describes how the digital revolution is transforming economies and, as a result, changing the nature of employment opportunities for youth. ▪ Chapter 3: An Integrated Framework for Digital Jobs o Lead: RAND Corporation o Introduces a new digital jobs typology to define digital work, classify sectors driving the demand for digital jobs, and identify the skills necessary for workers to fill these jobs ▪ Chapter 4: Young Women and the Digital Economy o Lead: Plan International o Identifies underlying factors contributing to the global gender digital divide, the implications for young women’s digital employment, and the benefits of new digital job opportunities for young women. 2 Case studies can be found in Annex B. 2 ▪ Chapter 5: Promising Practices for Gender-Inclusive Digital Jobs Interventions for Youth o Lead: S4YE Secretariat o Presents approaches implemented by S4YE coalition members and other youth employment stakeholders to overcome supply- and demand-side barriers to youth digital employment. ▪ Chapter 6: Empowering Young Women in the Digital Economy o Lead: S4YE Secretariat o Provides a description of various efforts by public- and private sector stakeholders to reduce the gender digital divide and support gender-inclusive digital youth employment programs. The annexes are structured as below: ▪ Annex A: Case Study Guidelines and Template o Lead: S4YE Secretariat o Presents the methodology and learning questions to guide the data collection process and inform case study development. ▪ Annex B: Case Studies o Lead: Accenture, BMZ, Genesis Analytics, Microsoft, Plan International, S4YE Secretariat, World Bank Group o Describes the experiences of several members of the S4YE coalition in designing and implementing digital jobs programs for youth, including the strategies adopted to improve employment outcomes for young women. ▪ Annex C: List of External Digital Jobs Programs, Platforms & Initiatives o Lead: S4YE Secretariat o Lists the digital jobs programs, platforms and initiatives examined during the literature review to identify promising practices for design and implementation. ▪ Annex D: Online Consultations Report o Lead: S4YE Secretariat o Presents perspectives and experiences of beneficiaries of digital jobs programs, program staff and implementers, and firms that hire youth for digital jobs. 3 2. Youth in the Digital Economy Highlights ▪ High youth unemployment rates, youth NEET rates, and the high numbers of working young people who live in poverty, have made youth employment a global priority. ▪ The digital economy is creating new work opportunities which increasingly require young people to develop new skills and new ways of learning. ▪ Reducing gender gaps in youth labor force participation can be transformative for LMICs hoping to leverage the full benefits of the digital economy. ▪ To increase women’s participation in the digital economy, new program models must be developed to address women’s specific needs. ▪ Youth employment programs for digital jobs must address demand-side constraints to digital job creation, as well as specific barriers to young women’s access to these jobs. 2.1 Youth Employment: A Global Priority Young people are disproportionately affected by unemployment.3 The ILO estimates that almost 65 million youth aged 15-24 years were unemployed in 2017.4 Youth unemployment rates remain higher than unemployment rates within any other age group, and are over 300% higher than the unemployment rates for adults (persons over 25 years).5 Table 1.1 captures youth unemployment rates and the total youth labor force for low-, middle- and high-income countries. The global youth labor force is shrinking. Youth unemployment rates are projected to decline from 12.6% to 12.5% between 2017 and 2018. However, this decline is mainly due to the fall in total youth labor force participation rates. The ILO projects that approximately 509 million youth aged 15-24 will be in the global labor force as of 2019. This marks a decrease from 522 million in 2015. The youth labor force in high- and middle-income countries are also projected to decrease, while rapidly growing in low-income countries. 3 For this report, “youth” generally refers to persons aged 15 to 35 years. However, different agencies and organizations utilize different definitions. For example, for statistical purposes, ILO defines youth as persons between the ages of 15 and 24 years (inclusive). Wherever possible, the differences will be highlighted. 4 ILOSTAT, http://www.ilo.org/ilostat/. Table reflects data updated as of June 2018. 5 ILO 2017. 4 TABLE 1.1 YOUTH UNEMPLOYMENT RATES AND LABOR FORCE SIZE YOUTH UNEMPLOYMENT RATE (%) 2015 2016 2017 2018* 2019* WORLD 12.4 12.6 12.6 12.5 12.5 High Income Countries 14.3 13.2 12 11.2 11.1 Upper-Middle Income Countries 13.8 15 15.4 15.1 15.1 Lower-Middle Income Countries 11.8 12 12.1 12.2 12.3 Low Income Countries 9.2 9.3 9.2 9.2 9.3 YOUTH LABOR FORCE (MILLIONS) 2015 2016 2017 2018* 2019* WORLD 522.7 517.2 513.8 511.2 509.3 High Income Countries 64.9 64.9 64.1 63.2 62.3 Upper-Middle Income Countries 169.8 162.8 157.8 153.7 150.2 Lower-Middle Income Countries 209.3 208.8 208.8 208.7 208.7 Low Income Countries 78.8 80.7 83.1 85.6 88.1 * Data for 2015-2017 are estimates while data for 2018-2019 are projections. Source: ILOSTAT, http://www.ilo.org/ilostat/. Youth experience high incidence of working poverty. The ILO estimates that approximately 10.6% of employed adults aged over 25 years earned less than USD 1.90 per day in 2017.6 In contrast, almost 17% of employed youth, or approximately 66 million young workers, were living below the extreme poverty threshold. Table 1.2 depicts youth working poverty rates for high- income, middle-income and low-income countries.7 TABLE 1.2 YOUTH WORKING POVERTY RATES YOUTH WORKING POVERTY RATE (%,