Bosnia and Herzegovina has the world’s highest youth unemployment rate. But growing tourism is opening up a new, fast-growing profession. Maintain eye contact while talking to tourist groups. Read a few books. And sound confident. At the age of 24, Emina Toric knows the basic tricks of the trade for tour guides in Sarajevo. “From the 10th century to 1463, we were known as the Bosnian kingdom” — that’s her standard opening sentence. But it helps that she learned the capital of every country while in high school. Her industry is getting crowded, and she wants to stand out. It will help her migrate. Bosnia and Herzegovina has the world’s highest youth unemployment, at 55.5 percent, according to the World Bank. But the small nation of 3.8 million people in southeast Europe is also witnessing a tourism boom. Foreign tourism has increased by more than 20 percent in just the past three years, among the highest rates of growth in the world, according to the U.N.’s World Tourism Organization. That’s a fact Prime Minister Denis Zvizdic proudly iterated to a group of journalists including this writer in September. This explosion is increasingly making tourism a key driver of the economy, its contribution to the national GDP rising from 7 percent in 2016 to 9.6 percent in 2017. That’s expected to go up to 12.5 percent of the GDP by 2028. The sector directly or indirectly supported 81,500 jobs or 11.2 percent of total employment in 2017, and that’s expected to rise to 103,000 jobs or 15.2 percent of total employment by 2028. But within the industry, there’s one particular job that’s attracting the country’s youth, who at their age often don’t have houses they can rent out to tourists for money. It’s the job of a tour guide. |