A project aimed at engaging youth at risk in productive activities, and at preventing them from joining violent groups, was launched in November 2012 in Bosaso and Galkayo. The project, funded by the Government of Japan, is being implemented by Somali Family Services in partnership with the International Labour Organization (ILO), UNDP and UNICEF. The project’s aim is to engage 475 youth in activities that provide them with entrepreneurship and vocational skills, as well as experience in labor-intensive work.

The project covers both Bosaso and Galkayo, where SFS has established regional offices. Recognizing the importance of not only providing training but empowering the youth through providing them with hands-on opportunities to start and run their own businesses, the project will include a business-start up competition, whereby 200 youth who submit promising business proposals will be awarded 500 USD each and encouraged to form cooperatives.

In November 2011, SFS’s Executive Director Abdurashid Ali traveled to Bossaso to meet the youth and the city’s mayor to speak about the program activities. Meanwhile, in Galkayo, SFS was able to launch labor-intensive activities aimed at reconstructing two of the city’s main roads in December 2011, despite the city’s security challenges.  During the public launch of the road reconstruction project, the mayor of Galkayo thanks SFS and ILO personally for their contribution to improving the city’s infrastructure.