Technology can create a paradigm shift in hygiene, says Sesame

The gap between skill training and employment has expanded, resulting in a situation in which young people are unable to obtain employment and companies are unable to pick workers who are suitably trained for the job.

With the forced rise in digital usage, it can be observed that an expanding opportunity for underprivileged children to gain skills will allow them to work in the aspirational service sector, such as customer service, retail, BPO, F&B, and sales. As more services move online, students about to enter the workforce, as well as workers in retail outlets, educational institutions, and administrative occupations, are learning new skills to cope with the virus and adapt into Covid's digital economy.

There is a lot of availability of low-cost smartphones and low-cost data rates in India,  which creates an opportunity for youth to access high-quality online training programmes that can not only increase employability and provide an opportunity for previously unemployed or underemployed youth (a whopping 47% of the workforce) to secure their livelihoods.

Meanwhile, the hygiene of underprivileged children have also deteriorated during COVID-19 pandemic. Sesame Workshop India has teamed with Planet Water Foundation to target the diarrheal season (diarrhoea deaths peak in January) to renew and reaffirm the importance of handwashing and maintaining hygiene as a sure-fire way of preventing the disease, which is the world's eighth-leading cause of death. Diarrhoeal illness is the second greatest cause of death in children under the age of five years old, accounting for 370,000 deaths in 2019. (WHO data).

Children's health and well-being are dependent on safe drinking water, sanitation, and cleanliness. SWI has concentrated on technology and story-telling to bridge the communication gap and reach out to children and their families in order to catalyse a paradigm shift in the behaviours of the people, thanks to the expansion of digital communication tools.

SWI has reached 216 million children under the age of eight in India through content and programmes on early literacy and numeracy, WASH and hygiene, nutrition, and gender equality in homes, classrooms, and communities. SWI helps students catch up and be ready for school in the next academic year by providing home-based education to over 90,000 children in nine states. Sesame Workshop India creates and distributes high-quality, engaging material via television, radio, community radio (CR), digital, and on-the-ground outreach.