Transforming Youth Skills

Empowering the next generation for a better future.

World Youth Skills Day (WYSD) is an initiative by the United Nations General Assembly, observed on the 15th of July every year. It is about enabling the youth with skills for employment, work, and entrepreneurship. WYSD marks the outstanding skills and talents of young people across the globe. The theme for 2022 is ‘Transforming youth skills for the future.’

Achieving this objective requires a collaborative effort by Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) institutions, companies, employers and workers organisations, policy-makers and development partners. Abiding by the Qatar National Vision 2030 with focus on the development of all people to enable them to build a prosperous and sustainable society together. GWC, Qatar’s leading logistics and supply chain solutions provider, is leading by example, by actively contributing to increasing skill development amongst the country’s youth.

Focus on Vocational Education

The UN Sustainable Development Goal 4 speaks about ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education and promoting lifelong learning opportunities for all. Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) is key to equipping young people with essential skills required to access the world of work and develop skills for entrepreneurship.

Recognising the need for vocational education among the youth, GWC took the initiative of collaborating with several universities in Qatar including Qatar University, Community College of Qatar, and Northwestern University among many others. And has created internship programs in different verticals and functionalities of logistics and supply chain management such as warehouse operations management, freight forwarding, distribution, transportation, and more. This effort is to help students identify potential career options in the logistics industry and achieve them.

Preparing for The Real World

According to the International Labour Organisation, the pandemic left 1 in 6 young people jobless thus highlighting the growing skill gap globally. This gap needs to and can be bridged through education and training, both of which are essential to safeguarding youth employment in the future.

While the world continues to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, there are several other challenges to the world of work posed by rapid technological changes seconded by skills and competencies that will be in demand in the future. To address these challenges and reduce access barriers, GWC’s Corporate Social Responsibility program offers a Summer Internship Program to all in-school and out-of-school young people. It provides Qatari nationals, children of employees and students with valid QID access to state-of-the-art technologies and skill-building opportunities along with exposure to a live work-like environment. Ensuring they gain relevant skills and practical work experience in the area related to their long-term career goals.

Opportunities to Work and Grow

Young employees perform well when they are encouraged graciously. By implementing industry best practices, GWC conducts exclusive in-house orientation programs towards the development of skills for young employees when they join the company. Many programs are extensive and cover various subjects that are a part of the Personal Development Induction Pack. Having full engagement of the youth is critical to generating positive change and innovation.

With that insight, GWC’s Corporate Responsibility program provides young people employment opportunities by conducting a Summer Internship which is a 4 to 8 weeks program for students in high school, college, and universities. Furthermore, GWC actively participates in various career fairs conducted by Qatar’s universities to extend job opportunities to the youth of Qatar. To date, GWC has successfully trained 46+ interns from different universities and helped many among them find suitable careers within GWC.

Development Beyond Academic Learning

Alongside imparting knowledge and building a skill-base through the initiatives of vocational training & development, summer internships, induction programs, etc, it is important to enable our youth to explore their interests and creative instincts beyond academic learning.?

Championing this approach, GWC continues to collaborate with local students and alumni from the humanities faculties to encourage and support interesting passion projects.

GWC recently collaborated with the Department of Painting + Printmaking (PAPR) at VCUArts Qatar for the creation of a series of 29 bespoke artworks capturing the vision, ethos, and culture of the company. Installed at GWC Regional Logistics Hub at Ras Bufontas Free Zone, the artworks showcase local and national character while reflecting the intent and capabilities of the new regional centre. The result of the collaboration with young artists from VCUarts Qatar has been nothing short of spectacular and is a testimony to the talent & skills possessed by the youth.

In tandem with the goals of World Youth Skills Day, GWC is actively reimagining youth skills by providing technical and vocational education and training that is future-focused and enabling the youth of Qatar to thrive in an ever-changing world.