Impact Evaluation of a Training Program with the Private Sector in Tunisia 

The research offers an evidence-based evaluation of the effectiveness of a development project for employment promotion through qualification and labour market policy. The development project, in collaboration with the private sector, offers unemployed Tunisians a three-month training programme in the textile, tourism and plastics industries, with a guaranteed job upon successful completion. The training contributes towards improving the employment situation of the Tunisian population and fostering private-sector development. The findings will shed light on the effectiveness of specific labour market interventions and will help in designing targeted German development cooperation projects in the future.

DEval will fund a rigorous impact evaluation of a labour mobility programme in Tunisia as an interesting case study for restructuring programmes in partner countries of German development cooperation projects.

Context

The economic situation in Tunisia is very tense. In 2021, the budget deficit amounted to 8.6% of GDP and public debt to 83.9% of GDP. To avert a sovereign default, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and Tunisia agreed on a structural adjustment programme which includes reducing government spending on the salaries of state employees and reforming state-owned enterprises. This will ultimately result in employees from the public-sector and state-owned enterprises transitioning to the private sector. Unemployment is already very high in Tunisia at 18%. It is especially high among women, younger people and graduates. At the same time, the private sector is experiencing a shortage of qualified staff. In this context, there is a very high demand for targeted education and specialised training. The development project aims to meet this demand by providing private sector-led industry-specific trainings to unemployed individuals with tertiary education.

Innovation & Method

The research project “Impact Evaluation of a Labour Mobility Programme in Tunisia” evaluates the GIZ project “Inter-company training with the private sector in Tunisia”. The intervention is a three-month training programme for individuals who are tertiary educated and unemployed.

The evaluation design – an RCT – will detect a causal relationship between the intervention and employment outcomes by comparing employment outcomes of individuals in two groups. Groups will be formed using randomization at the individual level. Group 1 will receive the training, whereas Group 2 will pe put on a waiting list. Given the random allocation, comparing means in employment rates across the two groups gives the causal effect.

Expected results/Research questions

The impact evaluation will answer the overall research question on whether and how certain types of active labour market policies generate private-sector employment for vulnerable populations. It will focus on how employment can be created for people who have tertiary education but are unemployed.

The objectives of the research project are three-fold. First, we want to understand what kind of interventions can be effective in supporting vulnerable individuals to transition from unemployment to private sector jobs. Second, heterogeneity analyses will reveal what type of worker benefits from results from the intervention. Third, we want to inform future trainings on additional outcomes such as poverty reduction or migration intentions.