Global youth unemployment rate predicted 12.7% until 2016

The global youth unemployment rate is forecasted to rise to 12.7 percent this year and will likely stay there until 2016, according to an International Labor Organization report published on Tuesday, Bloomberg reported.

Almost 75 million people worldwide between the ages of 15 and 24 are unemployed, according to the Global Employment Trends for Youth 2012 report.

The ILO said, "Since 2007, the global youth unemployment rate has started rising again, and the increase between 2008 and the height of the economic crisis in 2009 effectively wiped out much of the gains made in previous years," according to Bloomberg.

The report noted that many skilled young people were forced to take part-time or unskilled jobs because of the economic crisis, according to the BBC. The report warned of a "crisis," where more than six million people have given up looking for employment because they are so disillusioned.

The ILO said governments should make job creation a priority. It also suggested more training programs and tax breaks for employers, said the BBC.

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Since 2007, the number of young people without jobs has risen by four million, said the report. The number of unemployed youth was at its peak in 2009, at 75.4 million at the height of the financial crisis. If those who have given up looking for jobs were included, the global youth unemployment rate for 2011 would rise from 12.6 percent to 13.6 percent, said Agence France Presse.

The unemployment rate among North African youths after the Arab Spring uprisings was 27.9 percent, while the Middle East saw 26.5 percent unemployed. Central and south-eastern Europe saw a slight drop to 17.6 percent and Latin America and the Caribbean hovered around 14.3 percent.

South-east Asia and the Pacific had an unemployment rate of 13.5 percent while Sub-Saharan Africa stood at 11.5 percent, according to AFP.

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CNBC noted that Spain and Greece have recorded unemployment levels of over 50 percent among the youth, while dealing with the eurozone debt crisis.

"The austerity measures currently implemented in a wide range of developed economies bode ill for a quick recovery of youth labor markets," said the report, according to CNBC.

"The youth unemployment crisis can be beaten but only if job creation for young people becomes a key priority in policymaking and private sector investment picks up significantly," said Jose Manuel Salazar-Xirinachs, the executive director of ILO's employment sector, according to the BBC.

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