ABOUT THE PROJECT

Saksham, launched in 2010, is a Plan International initiative to enable youth from urban and rural disadvantaged areas to realise their dreams by equipping them with market-oriented vocational skills in the age group of 18-35 years. This not only helps them to access decent employment but also makes them representatives of a gender equal society and better citizens. Plan International provides the youth with opportunities to escape poverty and become economically secure by giving them the skills to get a job or be self-employed through training and employment. Youth are being provided training on workplace and English communication, basic computer and internet skills, life skills and financial literacy. Saksham is implemented in partnership with civil society and training organisations.

Saksham has a strong focus on providing training to girls challenging gender stereotypes and discrimination. The parents, communities, and employers are engaged on the subjects gender equality, equal opportunities, and economic empowerment of girls. The project encourages young girls to take up skill training and employment opportunities to build a workforce of trained girls. Local businesses and employers are engaged in the project to promote women-friendly work environments. Girls and women are amongst the most vulnerable section of society. Thereby Saksham has specific focus on girls, wherein at least 60% of trained youth should be girls and gender mainstreaming is an integral part of project planning and training delivery.

PROJECT APPROACHES

The project provides youth market linked trainings, decent employ­ment, entrepreneurship training and opportunities to work with their communities. This enables them to get jobs and become self-employed. Pedagogy includes life-skills, computers, workplace communication and financial literacy training.

• Job Oriented Vocational Training (JOVT): This refers to processes and trainings undertaken in Saksham to provide youth access to job oriented vocational training and formal jobs.


• Vocational Training for Entrepreneurship Promotion (VTEP): This refers to processes and trainings undertaken to provide youth access to training for entrepreneurship, interchangeably referred as self-employment.


• Gender Mainstreaming: This is an important strategy across all work undertaken in Saksham. This enables youth to understand gender relations at personal, community and work spaces.


• Decent Employment: Saksham approach is guided by the principles of decent employment, which focusses on enabling environment, equal wages and freedom of expression for youth.

The proposed project will support 40 youth especially girls with start-up kits for livelihood opportunities in beauty salons, health and wellness, mobile repairing amongst others