A/HRC/40/31 76. The Empower Her initiative in Tunisia, funded by the World Bank, aims at reinforcing the economic independence of women, facilitating technological solutions for starting their own business. The initiative brings young, unemployed new technologies graduates together with rural women to create start-ups for applications that help provide services for women in the interior regions of Tunisia. The applications aim to help women sell their handicrafts by providing them with access to markets and materials. They can also provide high technology jobs and other opportunities for the young start-up entrepreneurs. D. Creating decent jobs 77. Some States have opted to introduce economic incentives for private companies that hire unemployed young people, such as the Sustainable Employment for Young People programme in Slovenia, the Jobs Plus Youth programme in Ireland, the Contributions Act in Croatia (which rewards long-term contracts) and a programme in the Plurinational State of Bolivia that covers 45 per cent of the related labour costs. The programme reported a budget of $40 million and facilitated the entry into the labour market of 1,224 young people in 2018. 78. Mauritius has implemented the Youth Employment programme, which provides placement and training for unemployed youth aged between 16 and 35. The programme aims at enabling unemployed youth to obtain training/placements for an initial period of one year with the possibility of permanent employment thereafter on condition of satisfactory performance. If the unemployed youth have not been able to secure a job after the one-year training under the Youth Employment Programme, they are allowed another year of placement under the same programme. VI. Conclusions 79. Today, we have the largest generation of young people in history, with an enormous source of talent, creativity and energy. They possess great potential to drive social progress, inspire political change and move the world forward in achieving the 2030 Agenda and in promoting and protecting all human rights. At the same time, young people face tremendous challenges in enjoying their human rights. An alarming number are not in education, training or employment, leading to disproportionate levels of unemployment and exploitation. In particular, many young people go through a long and difficult process in transitioning from school to work and lack adequate educational opportunities to build their skills. 80. To tackle the barriers youth face in accessing and participating in the labour market, States should put in place concerted legislative, policy and budgetary measures with a strong gender lens, not only in the area of the right to work but also in the area of interrelated and interdependent rights, such as the right to social security, the right to education and the right to participate in public affairs. This approach fosters youth’s empowerment and requires a fundamental shift to lay out the conditions for promoting young people as agents of their own future, change and progress. 81. In particular, States should: (a) Protect young people from all forms of labour exploitation and agebased discrimination in accessing and participating in the labour market. States should ensure young workers enjoy just and favourable conditions of work, including safe and healthy working conditions, a wage that would ensure an adequate standard of living and equal pay for work of equal value. States’ regular work inspections and acquisition of data on youth employment, disaggregated by age and sex, could contribute to counter labour standards violations against young workers; (b) Remove all barriers and ensure equality and non-discrimination in access to work, including by: 14