United Kingdom’s Department for International Development (DFID)’s Skills for Employment Programme (SEP) aims to promote productive domestic employment opportunities instrumental for transformational economic growth in Nepal.  The project will also work to promote increased incomes for migrant workers (through reduced cost of migration and increased incomes in employment) and facilitate higher savings and productive investment of remittances.               
                                                      
The project will provide support across thematic areas of social dialogue, industrial relations, labour market governance and employment promotion. Project activities will be targeted to increase government capacity for employment centric planning, promote better implementation of labour law and social security, and improve legal and policy environment for governance of foreign employment.

Project objectives

Project outcomes

Outcome 1: Improved coordination and partnerships for job creation in Nepal

Outcome 2: Improved implementation of the relevant laws and policies for better labour market functioning and for addressing specific barriers to decent work for the most marginalized

Outcome 3: National policies strengthened and implemented to enhance the governance of labour migration in Nepal

Outcome 4: Bilateral and regional mechanisms strengthened to improve Nepali migrant workers’ access to better jobs

These outcomes are in alignment with Priority 1 of the Decent Work Country Programme (2018-22), United Nations Development Assistance Framework (UNDAF 2018-22) and Goal 8 of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

Strategy

The following key strategies will drive the project's activities across project areas of Province 2 and 5:

• development of inclusive and smart partnerships that ensures representation of specific groups (particularly youth - with a focus on women, girls and marginalized groups) in formal decision-making processes and coherence across approaches on job creation;
• mobilization of regional and global experts drawing from ILO Decent Work Team for South Asia and Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific;
• close technical collaboration with Government at all levels to promote job creation, implementation of labour law and social security, and to improve governance of labour migration.      

Target beneficiaries

The direct beneficiaries of the project will be the ILO’s tripartite partners, civil society organisations youth organizations, private sector and think tanks who are already working on issues related to job creation, supporting formal and productive work, as well as labour migration.

The ultimate beneficiaries of the project are:

• youth in Nepal;
• prospective labour migrants;
• Nepali migrant workers;
•  women and disadvantaged groups.