Bangladesh’s employment challenge is no longer simply about the number of unemployed youths; it is about whether education and skills systems can equip people with market-relevant competencies and connect them to productive and sustainable employment. This challenge is unfolding amid a difficult economic backdrop of slowing growth, subdued private investment, energy constraints, limited access to finance and rising non-performing loans, which are weakening business expansion and employment creation. Against this backdrop, the Government’s Five-Year Strategic Framework for Reform and Development (FYSF) sets the creation of 10 million new jobs within five years as its North Star target, placing employment and human-capital development at the centre of the national economic agenda.
The scale of the challenge is substantial: according to the Bangladesh State of the Economy 2025, unemployment rose from 3.35% in 2023 to 3.66% in 2024, youth unemployment reached 8.07%, and tertiary-educated unemployment stood at 13.54%. Around 84% of employment remained informal, while female labour-force participation declined from 41.5% to 38.4%. Agriculture accounted for 44.67% of employment but only about 11% of GDP, compared with 17.37% of employment in industry and 37.96% in services. Bangladesh therefore needs not only more jobs, but stronger investment, more productive employment and a workforce equipped with the competencies demanded by a changing economy.
Government does not directly create jobs. Sustainable employment is generated by business entities, industries, farms, service providers and entrepreneurs; Government’s role is to create the favorable conditions and atmosphere for them to expand and ensure the workforce has the competencies to seize those opportunities. FYSF must, therefore, become an integrated employment strategy across all sectors. Every sectoral investment plan should ask four questions: How many jobs could this generate? Which occupations will be required? What competencies will they demand? Where will those workers come from? Employment then becomes an explicit planning parameter.
Historically, our education system has struggled to connect education with the labour market. Multiple streams of education have largely focused on certificates rather than meaningful employment, producing many certificate-holders without adequate real-life skills. The result is a striking paradox: unemployment among tertiary graduates is almost three times the national average. The system has been more focused on enrolling a child at six than ensuring that, at 26, that person can enter the formal labour market.
The Government’s commitment to creating 10 million new jobs within five years places employment at the centre of economic transformation. The Five-Year Strategic Framework for Reform and Development (FYSF) provides a strong basis for repositioning TVET from a peripheral education stream into a central instrument for employment, productivity and economic growth.
TVET is therefore not a second-best option or a fallback for those who do not enter university. It is a critical mechanism bridging education and employment, turning knowledge into practical competence and competence into productive work. The focus must shift from access to outcomes: from ‘How many students are we training?’ to ‘How many graduates become competent, employed, productive and able to progress?’ Demand should shape occupational standards and curricula, workplace learning should be integral to training, and tracer data should inform future investment. Industry must be treated not merely as an employer, but as a co-producer of skills.
Around 2.2 million young people enter the labour market each year, making it essential to understand where employment opportunities exist – both at home and abroad. Overseas employment already provides a major outlet, but a large share of workers remains low- or semi-skilled. Bangladesh therefore needs better intelligence on country–occupation–skill demand. Government should establish a National Labour-Market Intelligence Mechanism, linking BBS, DTE, NSDA, BMET, BTEB, employers and industry associations. Bangladesh’s foreign missions can also help identify emerging overseas demand and communicate it to relevant agencies. An annual National Occupation and Employment Outlook could guide training and investment decisions. For overseas employment, the pathway should be:
At home, career guidance, employment exchanges and job-matching platforms must become integral parts of education and training. New formal jobs alone cannot transform employment. Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) can help an experienced electrician, welder or caregiver certify existing competence and bridge into the formal economy. MSMEs and self-employed workers also need access to digital tools, technology, entrepreneurship support, finance and markets. Formalisation should not only mean regulation, but it should also bring practical benefits such as access to finance, social protection and larger markets. Government should also promote district-level enterprises and service clusters which should look like:
Delivering 10 million jobs is a shared responsibility of all ministries and agencies, requiring a common government-wide framework rather than isolated projects.
Market intelligence and forecasting: Government should establish a national mechanism to collect, analyse and publish labour-market information, with sector-wise occupation and skills outlooks linked to regional investment and employment plans.
Skill-based blended education: Education and training providers should align programmes with labour-market demand and strengthen competency-based and dual training, apprenticeships, RPL, industrial attachment, digital and green skills, and industry-led assessment.
Multiple pathways to employment: Create flexible pathways through diplomas, short-cycle training, apprenticeships, workplace learning, RPL, entrepreneurship, higher education and overseas employment, supported by career guidance and job-placement services.
Targeting international markets: As domestic markets approach saturation, commercial counsellors in foreign missions should identify international skills demand and channel market information and employment opportunities to relevant government agencies and training providers.
Bridging education and employment: Employers should be involved from the beginning in defining competencies, curriculum design, workplace learning, assessment and recruitment to reduce skills mismatch and improve employment transitions.
Measure employment outcomes: TVET investment should be assessed through employment at six and twelve months, job retention, earnings, employer satisfaction, female participation, overseas placement and progression to further learning.
Decentralise enterprise creation: Promote district-level enterprise clusters, SME supplier development and local value chains, enabling large conglomerates and industries to grow alongside competitive local enterprises, with stronger linkages across production, processing, logistics, distribution and services.
A national cultural transition around TVET: Launch a sustained national awareness campaign to end the stigma of TVET as a last option and establish it as a respected, first-choice pathway for employment, entrepreneurship and further education.
The reforms for structured employment approaches cannot be sustained through projects/programmes alone. Bangladesh must formalise a national TVET ecosystem supported by a clear legal and policy framework that defines the roles, responsibilities and accountability of all relevant institutions and actors. This requires the enactment of a long-awaited comprehensive TVET Act that would bring together NSDA, BTEB, BMET, TMED and all other public and private organisations involved in TVET under a coherent national framework.
The Act should clearly define institutional mandates, establish coordination and accountability mechanisms, and ensure that each organization knows who is responsible for what and who is accountable to whom. This would help avoid duplication, overlapping and cross-cutting mandates, strengthen coordination, and ensure that all actors work towards a common national TVET agenda. The existing system therefore requires major policy and institutional reform to establish a coherent, coordinated and accountable national TVET system.
The strategic shift must be from certificates to competencies, from training supply to labour demand, from classroom to workplace learning, from fragmented statistics to labour-market intelligence, from survival work to productive employment, and from individual projects to a coordinated national system. TVET is the practical bridge between learning and work, but it cannot create 10 million jobs alone; it must work alongside investment, industry, MSMEs, entrepreneurship and a dynamic private sector.
The Government’s commitment to strengthening the quality, relevance and employment orientation of TVET is therefore part of a broader economic transformation agenda, and we are committed to translating the strategic plans and reform directions into tangible implementation – strengthening institutions, deepening industry engagement, improving labour-market responsiveness and ensuring that every major intervention leads to better skills, better jobs and better economic opportunities for the people of Bangladesh.
The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author
The writer is the Joint Secretary,Director (Planning & Development), and Directorate of Technical Education
