World Youth Skills Day 2022: Why is it celebrated - all you need to know

The World Youth Skills Day is celebrated every year on 15 July after the United Nations General Assembly's (UNGA) declaration in 2014. The day is celebrated to mark the "strategic importance of equipping young people with skills for employment, decent work and entrepreneurship", said a statement by UNESCO.

It added that the day has also provided a "unique opportunity for dialogue between young people, technical and vocational education and training (TVET) institutions, firms, employers' and workers' organizations, policy-makers and development partners."

This year, the day is being marked amid concerted efforts toward socio-economic recovery from the pandemic that are interconnected with challenges such as climate change, conflict, persisting poverty, rising inequality, rapid technological change, and demographic transition, among others.

World Youth Skills Day 2022 theme and celebrations:

Every year, the World Youth Skills Day is marked with a certain theme set by the United Nations. The theme for 2022 is 'Transforming youth skills for the future'. Last year, the theme was 're-imagining youth skills post-pandemic - aiming to help the youth recover from the devastation caused by the pandemic.

According to the UN agency UNESCO-UNEVOC, the main symposium will kick off a series of programmes and events to celebrate the day on Friday (IST). The opening plenary is set to focus on challenges and solutions faced by institutions in ensuring that TVET is demand-driven and future-focused. It will also feature prominent speakers from the region representing successful TVET alumni who have excelled in their domain, city leaders, policy-makers, practitioners, industry players, and academia.