Imran Sattar
We have been hearing over the years same things repeated in political and public discourse of Pakistan that youth are an asset, the future of country, the backbone of economy, and hope of future development of the nation. But even after this rhetoric, there has been no one significant change. Practical interventions or reforms, or practical policies to serve youth-based priorities, are limited.
The demographic profile of Pakistan is remarkable: almost two-thirds of the population is younger than 30 years old, and it should be a strategic resource for country’s development. Nonetheless, rather than taking center stage on the policy agenda, youth in the country are continually facing joblessness, skill imbalances, and government and institutional neglect. The disconnect between proclamations and practice reflects a consistent failure to translate demographic potential into national opportunity, leaving much of the country’s youthful population underutilised and brain-drained rather than capitalized and empowered.
Rising Young Unemployment and Skills Shortage
The recent labor statistics highlight the scale of the problem. The latest survey of Labor Force Survey 2024-25 indicated that young participation in labor market has risen to around 45.4% with a corresponding rate of unemployment of 12.6% amongst young people aged between 15 and 24 years, which is far higher than the national average.
This disjuncture echoes deeply-rooted structural problems: an inefficiency of educational output and its inappropriateness to actual requirements of market, inadequacy of quality vocational training, and absence of industry connections. The young people of Pakistan have faced a labor market that requires their skills, but they are not receiving proper training, and the gap between the two is not being addressed coherently, yet unachievable task of governmental planning.
The government declared National Youth Employment Policy (NYEP) in 2025, goal of which is to create 226,000 jobs per year via digital platforms and increased job-matching services. Almost one million young people are currently enrolled on the Digital Youth Hub, with 1.5 billion job ads on the hub. It was later suggested that a much bolder goal should be formulated: 1.5 million new jobs should be created in 2026, which will be accompanied by large budgetary investments in training, the development of skills, and the provision of loans to entrepreneurs.
Yet such efforts, though well-intentioned, were nowhere near the scale they needed to be. To absorb its swelling population, Pakistan would have to provide 2.53 million jobs that would absorb the growing workforce each year in the next decade, a task explicitly recognized by the World Bank.
Budgetary Allocations: An indicator of Low Priority
However, regardless of such high-profile policies, the issues touching on youth have not been adequately financed and included in the budget. Pakistan spends less than 1 per cent of its GDP on education and equally insignificant amounts on health, both building blocks of youth development. Without a significant change of budgetary focus, the programs will not be easily expanded, and more profound obstacles, especially those in rural and poorer provinces, will still exist.
Some regions, like Gilgit-Baltistan and Baluchistan, have established local youth policies, which express some needs as well as the initiative of the regions. To use the example of the Gilgit-Baltistan Youth Policy 2024, which aims to solve three issues: employment, empowerment, and inclusion, but structural issues remain, for instance, low literacy and lack of opportunities in the private sector.At provincial levels, there are attempts in Baluchistan to reach young people through education and business
Economic strains and lack of prospects are not abstract issues, but they have a concrete outcome. Highly qualified personnel, such as physicians, are leaving in large numbers to find better opportunities, thus draining the human-capital base of Pakistan. At the same time, millions of young Pakistani people are stuck with low-quality jobs or are completely out of labor market.The policymakers ought to take these trends seriously. It cannot be an afterthought in a country that is dedicated to growth in productivity, social stability, and competitiveness in the digital global economy.
The policy frameworks of government show that the government has known there are difficulties among the youth but this very knowledge has not been translated into action that is decisive enough. The magnitude of job creation, skills training, and education reforms is not in line with the demographic issue in Pakistan. It is high time that a shift towards ad hoc programmes is made in favor of a national strategy, with the government’s priority, extensive budgetary allocations, and quantifiable outcomes.
—The writer is contributing columnist,
based in Rawalpindi.
