Emirati youth hold key to development

DUBAI // Motivating and enabling Emirati youth and addressing challenges in the educational sector are key to making knowledge the foundation of sustainable development, according to the Arab Knowledge Report 2014.

The report will be launched on the second day of the ongoing Knowledge conference and is a joint initiative of the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Foundation and the Arab bureau in the United Nations Development Programme.

Identifying challenges that impede building a knowledge society was imperative, the report summary said.

Tackling educational challenges was vital in the UAE since the report shows that student performance in international tests taken in the country is still less than required.

Since other Arab countries including the UAE did not completely achieve their goals in the education field, this hindered their ability to innovate, the summary said.

This was despite high enrolment rates in universities, bridging the gap between males and females and fighting illiteracy in the UAE. There was also an imbalance in specialization since two-thirds of students in the UAE majored in arts, social and human sciences rather than sciences and math.

Professor Hamid al Naimiy, the chancellor of the University of Sharjah, said interest in basic sciences must be encouraged at an early age.

“Enrollment of students in sciences is very difficult,” said Mr al Naimiy, a professor of space astrophysics.

“Students here should be encouraged to take basic sciences in the primary and secondary level. To focus on basic sciences at the beginning is what I want to concentrate on. This is an international problem and not just in this region. Students are sometimes afraid of these subjects.”

One of the major challenges was the “lack of initiative and motivation among the youth and graduates who tend to seek secure jobs in the government sector,” the report also said.

Another problem the UAE faces is the limited number of citizens or human capital who make up only 11.5 per cent of the total population. This workforce must be developed to create cadres with skills and capabilities, the report advices.

“To develop their knowledge skills, thinking frameworks and values so as to transfer, localise, produce and employ knowledge effectively for their own benefit and that of the Emirati society as a whole,” was required according to the summary of the ‘Youth and localisation of knowledge’ section of the UAE report.

Assimilating Emirati youth in the process of knowledge transfer to establish a knowledge society through the youth was essential and should be implemented in various fields including education, scientific research, communication, culture, economics, media, technology.

Young people in the 19-29 age group in the UAE comprise 22.2 per cent of the total population as per 2013 estimates.

Transfer and localisation of knowledge is vital because UAE youth are the segment most capable to learn, train and be the drivers of innovation, the report said.

Emirati youth are the lever, main end and purpose of localisation of knowledge that covers consumption of knowledge, recycling it from its original form, acquisition, use and deployment.

The Arab Knowledge Report aims to help countries establish the foundation of sustainable human development by integrating knowledge and focussing on future generations.