Accenture has extended its partnership with UNICEF’s Generation Unlimited (GenU) public-private youth partnership platform to help improve the skills and employability of young people.

The business services firm first linked up with the charity’s initiative in 2021 and the new deal will see this partnership expanded and continue until 2028.

It originally signed up as a founding partner of GenU’s Passport to Earning (P2E) scheme, to provide young people with certificated free skills training.

The new phase of the partnership sees it continue this work and support a range of other initiatives through the platform.

This includes aiming to connect more than 188,000 young people to entrepreneurial activities through grants, seed funding and mentoring through GenU’s imaGen Ventures initiative.

Support to more than 300,000 marginalised young people will be offered through the Youth Marketplace Agency, a digital initiative aiming to build skills to tackle climate change, re-enter formal education, start a business and find work.

It is also hoped more than 92,000 marginalised young people will complete courses through P2E.

Through the partnership extension Accenture chief executive of growth markets Leo Framil has been appointed to GenU’s board.

Building on the success of our partnership with UNICEF’s GenU to date, we are excited to expand the scope of our efforts beyond skilling, to include greater support with the transition into jobs or starting businesses,” said Framil.

“I am delighted to join the GenU Board and look forward to helping drive systemic change addressing structural barriers to progress on a global level.”

Gen U chief executive Kevin Frey added: “I am thrilled that our partnership with Accenture is expanding, so that together we can prepare and empower even more young people with the relevant skills they need to enter and thrive in an evolving workforce.

Supporting young people in Brazil, Egypt, India, Philippines, South Africa and Turkey are a focus of the extending work by Accenture through GenU.

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