ILO’s World Employment and Social Outlook for 2015 had projected that the global employment outlook would deteriorate in the coming five years where employment growth may not match economic growth.

• In the face of globalisation and exposure to international markets, immunity shields have vanished.
• Economic cooperation through fora like G-20, BRICS etc need to be leveraged for a concerted effort to address labour and employment issues. For instance, BRICS countries represent nearly 42 per cent of world population and contribute to 20 per cent of global GDP giving it a unique position to leverage, its varied potential for meeting the global requirements, especially in technical resources.
• India too has followed the textbook path of economic development witnessing a sharp decline in the contribution of the primary sector in the GDP from 52 per cent during 1950-51 and has declined to 17 per cent in 2017-18. The corresponding contribution of the services sector to the GDP has gradually risen from 35 per cent (1950-51) to 54 per cent (2017-18)

Encouraging Private Investments in Industry:

In recent years a policy ecosystem has been evolved around

1. Make in India
2. Skill India

• Digital India

1. National Manufacturing Policy 2015
2. Ease of Doing Business
3. Atal Innovation Mission

• 100 Smart Cities and 500 Amrut Cities project
• Start-up India

1. Stand-up India.

These initiatives are building the basic to stimulate job creation momentum. The policy ecosystem for generating employment has two sides – supply side and demand side. The demand side impetus would mainly come from Make in India and National Manufacturing Policy initiatives and would be supported by initiatives like Smart City Project, Digital India, Start-Up and Stand-Up India. Demand side can be further reinforced by providing incentives to agro-based industries, labour-intensive industries like textile and leather, increasing public investment in education and health etc.

Enhancing Skill Base of Workforce:

The government has launched the National Skill Development Mission and established a Ministry of Skills Development & Entrepreneurship to focus on enhancing the skill base of workforce in a coordinated manner.

Enhancing Non-Farm Employment Opportunities:

For skilling of rural workforce, programmes like the National Food Security Mission, Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana (RKVY), Custom Hiring Centres, Establishment of Agri-Clinics and Agri-Business Centres (ACABC), Small Farmers’ Agribusiness Consortium (SFAC), National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC) Development of Women cooperatives have been initiated.

Modernising Public Employment Service (PES):

The National Career Service initiative aims at transforming the employment services using technology to improve delivery and quality of employment services.

Labour Law Reforms:

The broad objectives of the labour reforms include:

• Reducing uncertainty and complexity in labour legislation
• Creating a robust and comprehensive floor of rights
• Modernising dispute resolution and enforcement systems for good governance.

 The existing Labour Laws are being grouped into Labour Codes on functional basis. Four Labour Codes on Wages, Industrial Relations, Social Security and Welfare and Safety and Working Conditions are being drafted by simplifying, amalgamating and rationalizing the relevant provisions of the Central Labour Laws.

Increasing Female Labour Force Participation:

Government has taken several steps to increase the participation of women in the labour force like, MGNREGA, vocational training for skill enhancement etc. Government has amended the rules to facilitate women governmental employees for upbringing of their children by providing for 2 years child care leave.

Mainstreaming Informality:

Government announced three Social Security Schemes pertaining to the Insurance and Pension Sectors, namely

1. Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana (PMJJBY)
2. Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana (PMSBY)
3. Atal Pension Yojana (APY)

to move towards creating a universal social security system, focused especially at the poor and the under privileged. The schemes provide essential and affordable social protection to all citizens in a convenient manner linked to auto-debit facility from bank accounts. These schemes are expected to address the issue of low coverage of life and accident insurance and old age income security in the country.

Active Labour Market Policies (ALMPS):

• Allocating adequate budgetary resources to Active Labour Market Policies (ALMPS) are reported to be desirable as studies have shown that this can improve employment outcomes.
• Undertaking impact evaluations are important in developing an evidence-based approach to policy design.
• In a vast country like India with a strong demographic dividend, it is important to improve measures of employment through administrative statistics complemented by periodic surveys.

Evolving policies so that economic growth translates into increased and decent employment for the working force population would be important. Identifying and formalising changing context and forms of work (fixed term employment) would also assist in strengthening the employment market. Another step would be to encourage innovative solutions to address employment challenges. It is this, important to strengthen systems for data collection on labour market and promote evidence based analysis and research.