Mozambique - Skills for Employment and Economic Transformation Project

Overview & Synopsis

​The objective of the Operation is to create more and better jobs in priority value chains by strengthening the skills ecosystem. This Program Appraisal Document covers Phase 3 of the Skills for Economic Transformation and Jobs (SET4Jobs) in Eastern and Southern Africa Multiphase Programmatic Approach (MPA) Program, approved by the World Bank’s Executive Directors on February 26, 2026. This phase only finances activities for Mozambique. The design presented in this document is within the scope of activities offered in the SET4Jobs MPA. It is aligned with Pillars 1, 2, and 3 of the MPA and includes selected activities from each of the supported pillars across components. There are no changes to the MPA Program Development Objective (PrDO), key indicators and their targets, theory of change or MPA framework. The government’s Skills for Jobs program, supported by this PforR, seeks to address fragmentation and weak labor market relevance in Mozambique’s skills system, which have limited its contribution to job creation in priority sectors. It is aligned with the forthcoming National Skills Strategy, which emphasizes improved access to job-relevant skills and stronger employment outcomes for youth through greater industry engagement, results orientation, and use of digital solutions. The program builds on MozSkills and other previous World Bank-supported projects, which established the legal, institutional, and instructional foundations on which MozJobs is designed to deliver employment results, including the Professional Education Law, the National Qualifications Framework, ANEP's strengthened regulatory capacity, the competency-based training curriculum now reaching over 43,000 students, and initial employer engagement and digital infrastructure. MozJobs shifts from this foundation-building phase toward operationalization, guided by three cross-cutting principles that reflect these shifts: (a) employer engagement in the design, delivery, and co-financing of training to strengthen labor market relevance; (b) results-based financing mechanisms that link funding to independently verified outcomes; and (c) the use of digital and technology-enabled solutions to expand access, improve efficiency, and support system management.