Overview of the situation of young people who are not in education, employment, or training in Hungary

22/11/2021

Hungary has a high proportion of inactive young people, and their chances of entering the labour market has been made even worse by the COVID-19. What measures and programmes help them specifically? Are they effective?

The hybrid conference IPS4NEETS, organised jointly by the InterRegio Forum Association and the Hétfa Research Institute on 17 November 2021, explored the situation of Hungarian NEETs (Not in Education, Employment, or Training), presenting some of the organisations and programmes that help them, as well as the evaluation of the latter.

The event was organised because the InterRegio Forum Association has recently completed, and the Hétfa Research Institute has newly launched their own research on the subject, funded by the Norwegian Funds. The IPS4NEETS final conference was also an opportunity for researchers and organisations interested in the matter to share their knowledge and experience, thereby supporting young people stucked out of the labour market and education.

The main objective of the international research project Individual Placement and Support for NEETs through Education Youth Technology Platform (EYTP), in partnership with the InterRegio Forum, is to enable counsellors working with inactive young people to develop their professional competences through the "Maturing Model" (MM) and the "Individual Placement and Support" (IPS) methods, and thus to better find tailor-made solutions for youth in need.

The newly launched international research project "Lost Millennials: Transnational Research Network for the Evaluation of Initiatives Targeting 25+ NEETs", led by the HÉTFA Research Institute, will evaluate the impact of programmes targeting the age group of NEETs mentioned in its title.

Márton Csillag, Senior Researcher at BI, presented the lessons learnt from the international research Youth Employment PartnerSHIP. Concerning the 90-day job trial programme offered to young jobseekers under the Youth Guarantee Programme, he highlighted that although it has a positive impact (especially compared to public employment), the number of those most in need among the participants is lower. He also pointed out that only 40% of the participants were retained at the same firm after the end of the job trial, and many of them received lower wages than before.