Introduction

To build a sustainable nation in terms of prosperity and equity in the context of a saturating world economy, the hope lies on the youth. Young people constitute approximately one quarter of the global population, but in South Asia and Africa, one in three people is a young person. The major challenge is that empowering youth requires capacity building through quality education to enhance skill development, health and well-being to develop cognitive abilities for innovation and opportunities in decision making systems. This helps to ensure responsive, inclusive, participatory and representative decision making at all levels as per the 16th goal of SDGs. 

India’s rank in global youth development index, 2020 is 122 among 181 countries and falls in the category of medium youth development. Indian youth, presently, face challenges such as social inequality, economic globalization, demographic change and resource scarcity indicating gap in youth development. Each of them cuts across policy sectors and extends beyond national boundaries, demanding policymakers to adapt rapidly and learn from the examples of others to ensure sustainable governance in the country. The transition towards sustainability requires efforts on several fronts, but knowledge sharing and capacity building should be the fundamental platforms for these efforts. National Youth Policy (NYP) 2014 highlights that there are no methodical channels and instruments for engagement between the government and youth. 

Youth as a National Asset

World is home for around 1.8 billion young people who are between 15 and 29 years of age, which is greater than ever before. And also around 87% of them are living in developing countries. According to predictions, the ratio of young population is decreasing and it is predicted to fall below 20% by 2075 (Global youth development index & report, 2016). Therefore, this throws an unprecedented window of opportunity for the developing countries to reap the benefits of ‘demographic dividend’ in the coming decades. India is experiencing a youth bulge with the world's largest young populace of 356 million in the age group of 10 to 24 years and around 34.1% of India’s population falls between 15-34 years of age group. Youth, as a capital, demands huge amounts of resources that can harness their potential and create opportunities for development.

Overview of Youth Development at Global and National level

The youth development indicator scores at the Global, Commonwealth and India level for 2020 show a significant difference in some of the indicators as shown in table 1 and figure 1. The indicators used in the index are education, employment & opportunity, equality & inclusion, health & well-being, peace & security, political & civic participation.

Table1: Global youth development indicator

India is doing better in political & civic participation, health & well-being than global and the commonwealth whereas, the performance of India in terms of education, employment & opportunity, equality & inclusion, peace & security is less than global and the commonwealth. Overall YDI of India is trying to catch up with the global and commonwealth index with a narrow gap. 

The comparison of YDI scores of India, Global and the Commonwealth across each section using the HBS, 2012 white paper format is presented in table 2. As per the performance level, India, Global and Commonwealth are at medium level in overall YDI score and high level in education of youth. India is at medium level in employment, equality & inclusion whereas Global and the Commonwealth are performing high in employment & opportunity, very high performance in equality & inclusion. Performance of all three in health & well being, peace & security are at medium levels. Political & civic participation is low for India, Commonwealth and Global. Therefore, it is required to give more focus to the low and medium performing indicators as the priority areas for the holistic development of youth.

 

Figure 1: Youth Development Index, 2020

 

Table 2: Comparison of YDI across India, Global and the Commonwealth

Format source: White paper by HBS, 2012

I = India YDI score, G = Global YDI score, C = Commonwealth YDI score

Level: Low (1) = 0.00-0.595; Medium (2) = 0.595-0.691; High (3) = 0.691-0.78; Very high (4) = 0.78-1.00

The youth development index shows an increasing trend from 2010 to 2018 and it is approaching the Global and the Commonwealth index whereas the score remains almost same with slightest increase for Global and the Commonwealth index from 2010 to 2018. Still a lot needs to be done at low performing areas such as political & civic participation and other medium performing indicators to catch up with top performing countries. Improvements in these indicators shall equip the Indian youth to compete better with their International counterparts. Appropriate measures need to be taken at institutional and policy level to reap the benefits of demographic dividend of India.

Table 3: YDI score 2010 -2018 for India, Global and the Commonwealth

 

Figure 2: India’s YDI Score (2010-2018) 

Indian Youth Development Index 

The India Youth Development Index and Report was published by the Rajiv Gandhi National Institute of Youth Development (RGNIYD) in 2017. The indicator includes Youth Health Index (YHI), Youth Education Index (YEI), Youth Work Index (YWI), Youth Amenities Index (YAI), Youth Participation Index (YPI) and Youth Development Index (YDI) as shown in table 4 and figure 3. It is evident from the report that there is an improvement in education, health, amenities, political participation, and overall youth development with and without political participation from 2010 to 2016. Whereas there is a decrease in the youth work index and no remarkable improvement in youth political participation index from 2010 to 2016. Therefore, a serious thought should be given to identify the reason for the decreased Youth Work Index and measures to improve the youth employment and work status. 

Table 4: India Youth Development Index (2010-2016)

Source: India youth development index and report, 2017

 

 

Figure 3: India youth development index, 2016 (GOI)

Sustainable Governance Indicator (SGI)

The Sustainable Governance Indicators (SGI) are framed to address socio-political issues faced by developed states of the OECD and the European Union at the outset of the 21st century. Social inequality, demographic change, economic globalization and resource scarcity are some of the challenges cut across policy sectors and extend beyond national boundaries. This indicates that the governments need to safeguard the long-term health of their societies’ economic, social and environmental systems to maintain and improve the quality of life for present and future generations (Schraad-tischler & Seelkopf, 2015).

This instrument is built on three pillars – the Policy Performance Index, the Democracy Index and the Governance Index – that collectively indicate sustainable governance (Schraad-tischler & Seelkopf, 2015). This SGI instrument is used here to assess the measures of Youth Development Index of India, to suggest the indicators to be considered and a framework for youth specific sustainable governance indicators for the holistic development and measure of the youth as given in table 5. 

Table 5: SGI Status index – Policy performance

This presents the presence of Sustainable Governance Indicator in the India Youth Development Index and corresponding recommendations. Indicator is segmented into three categories namely economic, social and environmental affairs. In the category of economic affairs, the economy indicator, namely, youth economic policy, youth GDP per capita, youth potential output and growth rate should be considered. In the labor market indicator, work participation rate and work intensity of youth is considered but youth employment policy, low skilled unemployment, low pay incidence, long-term unemployment should be considered. In taxes and budgets, tax distribution of youth, youth budgetary policy, youth contribution to GDP, budget allocation to youth should be considered. In terms of research and innovation, youth R&D spending by public and non-public, total youth researchers, IPRs held by youth, patent applications by youth should be considered. 

In the category of social affairs, the education indicator has the similar indicator of India YDI. In health care indicators, Life Expectancy at the age of 15 years, Institutional Health Care are considered but other measures namely Spending on youth health programs, youth health policy should be considered. As far as the category of social inclusion is concerned, social inequality, share of youth with disability are measured whereas measures namely, Youth life satisfaction, youth gender equality in parliament, youth poverty rate, youth social inclusion policy, NEET rates should also be taken into account. 

In the families indicator, youth fertility rate, youth poverty, youth marital status should be considered. In the pensions indicator, Youth unemployment pension, youth disability pension should be considered. In the integration indicator, Youth integration policy, employment of youth from disturbed areas, disabled youth and foreign-born native, global youth exchange programs and total youth benefited from youth exchanges programs should be considered. In safe living indicators, Safe living conditions, homicides, thefts among youth and confidence in police should be considered. 

In the National inequalities indicator, Efforts to promote equal socioeconomic opportunities to youth of underdeveloped states, official development aid should be considered. In the environmental affairs, Youth concerned about - renewable energy, biodiversity, material recycling, waste generation, water usage, energy productivity, greenhouse gas emissions, particulate matter; total youth working on these areas/fields should be considered.

By considering above mentioned measures and items, a holistic measure of youth development can be achieved which can be termed as youth sustainable governance indicator (YSGI). This is an exercise of the capacity building of youth development measures holistically which provides an opportunity to identify the weak areas and concentrated efforts can be put to improve the conditions.   

Table 6: SGI Status index – Quality of democracy

Table 6 indicates the sustainable governance indicator status index for the quality of democracy. This presents the Sustainable Governance Indicator presence in the India Youth Development Index and corresponding recommendations. In the electoral process indicator, items namely share of youth participating in legislature, share of youth electors is considered. In the access to information indicator, the share of youth in the media industry, share of youth who accessed government information through RTI should be considered. In political rights indicators, the share of youth representatives in legislature and parliament and in decision making roles should be considered. In the civic participation indicator, items such as the share of youth participating in NYKS, NYC, and the share of college students participating in NSS and NCC are already considered. 

Conclusion

Sustainability in every sector is the need of the hour. From the reports of Global and National agencies, it is evident that India is performing better and advancing towards the brighter side with regards to the development of youth compared to previous years. But areas such as employment, education and civic participation demand serious efforts to improve the standards of youth. More indicators of economic, environmental and social SGI can be considered in measuring YDI. Capacity building of the Indian youth to be kept in mind for achieving SDGs.

Measuring the holistic youth development with the help of sustainable governance indicator is a prerequisite to ensure concentrated efforts. This addresses youth development, not only in the quality of democracy aspect, but also in all the spheres of sustainability namely, social, economic and environmental. Hence, the youth sustainable governance indicator (YSGI) as a part of capacity building of methodology and measuring technique of youth development is necessary to ensure youth’s contribution in sustainable governance. This helps in achieving social, economic and political inclusion of all irrespective of age, sex, disability, race, ethnicity, origin, religion or economic or other status by 2030 which is one among the 10thgoal of SDGs. This can serve as a decision-making tool for comprehensive youth development and evidence-based decision making.

 

References

1. CW Youth Development Index | CW Youth Development Index (thecommonwealth.org)

2. Commonwealth Secretariat. 2008. The Commonwealth Plan of Action for Youth Empowerment 2007–2015.www.youthdevelopmentindex.org/cms/cms-youth/_images/7150051245204522383408.pdf.

3. Commonwealth Secretariat. 2013. Youth Development Index 2013: Results Report. www. youthdevelopmentindex.org/cms/cms-youth/_ images/197918019952385f3219c75.pdf.

4. India, G. of. (2017). India Youth Development Index and Report 2017. Retrieved from www.rgniyd.gov.in

5. Inter-Parliamentary Union. (2014). Youth Participation in National Parliaments, 34. https://doi.org/10.1332/policypress/9781447300182.001.0001

6. Schraad-tischler, D., & Seelkopf, L. (2015). Concept and Methodology - Sustainable Governance Indicators 2015.

7. Secretariat, C. (2016). Global Youth Development Index and Report 2016 (Vol. 1). Commonwealth Secretariat.

8. Youth Policy Press. 2014. The State of Youth Policy in 2014. www.youthpolicy.org/library/wp-content/uploads/ library/2014_Special_Edition_State_Youth_Policy_ENG.pdf

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