18 million Swedish crowns of EU subsidies to companies in and around Ulricehamn were granted this week. I wrote the proposal and it has been a week of much attention and positive feedback. It is easy to be popular when you bring in money in hard times and hard times we have.
Our politicians talk about more money to stimulate growth and development or less taxes and regulations for businesses. There are many ways and the ideas often take an ideological path but I wish they would talk in more concrete terms. Sweden has the highest level of youth unemployment in Europe. If we want to help young people out of unemployment – what can we do? If they don’t want or are able to study or if they want to combine studies with work can we find suitable solutions?
I think we can but people in public organisations today are so stuck to the structures that it does not stimulate new creative ideas and cross over cooperation. I think it would be interesting to make a youth employability centre including several municipalities working with the motivation of young people. I also think that the people involved should be entrepreneurs, think tanks, experts on social media, new technology and most important – from other parts of the world. Many youth workers or unemployment officers today have little knowledge of starting your own business or creating your own future. How can a young person find a path to hang on to when the trainer is someone who just got a job from the unemployment office herself? Role models showing possible paths and trainers from different professions should be in charge of the training and all possibilities to international encounters should be rewarded.
The EU gives out a lot of money on work experience, voluntary work, youth exchanges and other youth projects and these opportunities of finance should be used to a much larger extent. We also need to change the mind setting of people and make them see the positive effects of international relations. It is not only about learning a different language or understanding a different culture. It is about becoming a world citizen and taking part and taking in all the possibilities we have outside the Swedish boarder. Migration will increase in the future and intercultural experience will be an essential skill for employability. Therefore all ideas surrounding what we should do with the unemployed youth should and need to have an international perspective.
With this I end my ideas regarding youth employability and wish you all a wonderful midsummer. Tomorrow Sweden will be a party place, the police will work extra hours but in my family we will do it the Dutch way. We skip the traditional haring and snaps and instead go for a barbeque with Dutch friends visiting us for the weekend. Cultural traditions are important but so is the choice to decide not to follow the usual pattern all the time!
Ulrika Geeraedts
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