Sam Jones presents on school-to-work transition in Mozambique at IMF/IGM Brown Bag

The Inclusive Growth in Mozambique programme jointly with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) representative office in Maputo launched a series of Brown Bag events on 31 August 2023, inviting UNU-WIDER Research Fellow Sam Jones to present on school-to-work dynamics in Mozambique in the inaugural session.

The objective of the IMF-IGM Brown Bag is to serve as a platform supporting knowledge exchange, innovation, and collaboration among economists and professionals involved in policy advice in Mozambique.

In his presentation, Sam Jones shared some of the key findings of the recent inquiries on the school-to-work transition of Mozambican higher education and TVET students produced under the Inclusive growth in Mozambique (IGM) programme, linking them to another IGM paper studying the role of online labour platforms in supporting labour market insertion (WIDER Working Paper 69/2022). His key message was that the Mozambican labour market has trouble absorbing its most qualified workforce. Also, based on the study of graduates of technical and vocational education and training (TVET) colleges, experimental evidence shows that while digital platforms represent a popular and growing tool to search for jobs, there is no clear evidence they generate better employment outcomes for the average young job-seeker.

The Brown Bag took place at the IMF office in Maputo, Mozambique, and gathered an audience consisting of economists from various development agencies and research institutes, including UNDP, the World Bank, International Growth Centre, and Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office(FCDO).