(Original title: Youth employment in Viet Nam, Characteristics, determinants and policy responses)
This working paper is a contribution to the Employment Policy Unit’s research programme, being
undertaken in the 2004-05 biennium, on youth employment in developing countries.
The transition to a market economy in Viet Nam involved a drastic modification of young men
and women’s transition from school-to-work. Today, many youth enter the labour market out of economic
necessity. Even though the potential to benefit from the country’s socio-economic successes of the past
15-20 years is great, youth in Viet Nam face a series of new challenges. For example, inequality,
polarisation and unemployment have appeared. The down-sizing of the public sector with disappointing
levels of foreign direct investment mean that job opportunities are confined to the predominant
agricultural sector where underemployment and poverty, though declining, are widespread. In that
context, the Vietnamese government has made the creation of decent jobs, the upgrading of skills and the
fight against unemployment its priority, with a special focus on youth.
The authors show that youth unemployment (at 5.7 per cent in 2002) is mainly linked to educated
unemployment among middle income households. They argue in favour of a mismatch between education
and labour market demand. Government policies have so far failed to redirect resources from general
higher education to vocational training and greater technical skills. The linkages between the education
and training system and the labour market have to be strengthened to close the gap between the skills in
demand and the skills offered on the labour market.
