Govt to expand nat�l service programme
The cabinet yesterday approved a proposal of the youth ministry to appoint 30,000 more unemployed youths in 20 upazilas of 20 districts of the country under the National Service Programme (NSP) to generate employment for jobless youths.
The approval was given at a cabinet meeting held at the secretariat with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in the chair.
After the meeting, Cabinet Secretary Muhammad Musharraf Hossain Bhuiyan told reporters that some 1,500 unemployed youths would be given training in each of the 20 upazilas of 20 districts on the basis of their poverty level.
Youth and sports ministry sources said the ministry will launch the fourth phase of the NSP to appoint 30,000 more unemployed youths in 20 upazilas of 20 districts. These youths would get handsome sums of money at the end of their service periods and would be able to start up businesses like poultry, dairy farming and pisciculture as the government wants to expand the programme across the country in order to combat unemployment, said the sources.
The government will provide the youths loans on easy terms so that they can carry out income-generating activities by utilising knowledge acquired from training and work experience, he further added.
Sources said some 17,000 unemployed youths have been appointed in the third phase of the NSP while 16,036 youths have been appointed in the second phase. In the first phase, 56,054 unemployed youths, aged between 18 and 35 years, were employed after a three-month basic training on 10 modules in 19 upazilas in Kurigram, Barguna and Gopalganj districts since 2010.
The government launched the programme in 2010 to fulfil its pre-election pledge to create temporary employment for at least one educated member in each family.
Under the NSP, the youth and sports ministry has imparted training to at least 88,000 unemployed youths and arranged jobs for them so far.
