The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has approved a $19.7 million project that will increase access to livelihood training opportunities and support services for women and youth in the Marshall Islands, including through new facilities and targeted quality skills development programs.
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The project will also enhance women’s and youth’s skills for livelihood improvement. Participants will receive informal skills training in areas such as financial literacy, basic bookkeeping, business planning, food safety, computer skills, health and wellness activities, and education sessions on topics such as parenting skills, gender-based violence, and youth’s and women’s rights.
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“The project will directly benefit at-risk youth and vulnerable women in Majuro and neighboring islands,” said ADB Senior Social Development Specialist Cindy Bryson. “Training and coaching in marketable skills, complemented by new childcare facilities, will promote women’s and youth’s participation in the workforce and may help mitigate local labor shortages.”
The Marshall Islands’ Women and Youth Skills, Empowerment, and Resilience Project will support the upgrading and expansion of climate-resilient infrastructure assets. This includes renovations to a facility in Majuro that will give women and youth access to training and support services, the construction of a disability-accessible two-story building nearby to create an expanded center and the construction of a new childcare center and family-friendly training and study facility at the College of the Marshall Islands.
Through the project, the Government of the Marshall Islands and civil society groups will receive training and mentoring to better support women and youth. The project will reestablish youth’s and women’s councils and hold national and regional youth and women’s events.
The $19.7 million grant comes from the Asian Development Fund (ADF) which provides grants to ADB’s poorest and most vulnerable countries. It is replenished every 4 years by the ADF’s donor countries.
About ADB
ADB is committed to achieving a prosperous, inclusive, resilient, and sustainable Asia and the Pacific while sustaining its efforts to eradicate extreme poverty. Established in 1966, it is owned by 69 members—49 from the region.
It assists its members and partners by providing loans, technical assistance, grants, and equity investments to promote social and economic development.
