The National Development Plan 2030 aims to reduce South Africa’s alarming levels of youth unemployment and to provide young people with economic opportunities.It also aims to expand public employment programmes to 2 million participants by 2020 and to create 11 million jobs by 2030.
Statistics South Africa (Stats SA) reports that while the unemployment rate for the general population is 27.2%, for youth aged 15-34 it is 38.8%.
To tackle this high rate of youth unemployment requires diverse, innovative and collaborative initiatives.
All key stakeholders – including the government, the private sector and youth formations – have to work together in order to alleviate the situation of millions of unemployed and discouraged young people.
A skills deficit, coupled with lack of experience, underlies their exclusion from participation in the labour market.
In the first quarter of 2018, the Quarterly Labour Force Survey showed that youth aged 15-24 numbered 10.3million in a nation of 57.4million and of these, 32.4% – about 3.3million – were not in education, employment or training (NEET).
Indeed, solutions to youth unemployment have to consider the specific needs of sub-groups such as graduates, those with just matric, and those without qualifications.
A one-size-fits-all approach to the challenge will fail.
The pact that emerged from the recent jobs summit between the state, labour and business is to target the creation of 275,000 jobs annually, through investments in areas such as infrastructure, the township economy and agriculture.
This resonates with goal eight of the sustainable development agenda, which is to promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment, and decent work for all.
It remains to be seen if this can be achieved in South Africa considering projections of sluggish economic growth.
To improve youth employability, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the government should promote entrepreneurship, increase investment in training programmes, raise awareness of existing programmes and increase funding.
For instance, the South African government could allocate more funding to organisations that focus on upskilling young people.
The Industrial Development Corporation could be a conduit to channel such funding.
These funds would provide support for new and existing entrepreneurs, and for skills development programmes.
SA’s persistently high youth graduate unemployment rate – 11.9% – remains a concern.
It is almost three times that of older adults – which itself is concerning at 4.4%.
Internship programmes in the private, public, and non-profit sectors – aligned with the qualifications of young graduates – are one avenue to tackle unemployment.
Still, the reality is that prospective employers prefer experienced older persons to newly minted young graduates. Also, entry-level jobs mostly require at least three years of experience.
The contradiction is that internship programmes are usually for not longer than 12 months. This means that on completion of their internships the graduates still do not have the required years of experience for entry level vacancies.
The government can work together with the private sector and other stakeholders to offer incentives for the retention of young employees.
Internship programmes could be for a period of three years instead of one.
This will guarantee graduates solid experience.
The Employment Tax Incentive (ETI) is one strategy that the government implemented to encourage employers to hire young workseekers.
It complemented existing learnership programmes by reducing employers’ costs of hiring young people through a cost-sharing mechanism with the government.
It allowed companies to make savings and, arguably, they may have hired young people with no intention of retaining them in the long term.
In addition, small companies – which are most in need of such initiatives – benefited less as they were unable to hire a large number of young people because of cost constraints.
Some 53% of big firms claimed the ETI, compared to only 22% of small firms.
These small firms are recognised as the engines of most economies globally.
Creating sustainable jobs is a difficult task that requires collaboration among different stakeholders.
It requires investing in generating evidence on what works and what does not work.
Agility in response to the changing global and local contexts, particularly changes in the labour market, is crucial.
The varying circumstances of unemployed young people also have to be considered.
The authors are based at the Youth Development Institute of South Africa, a collaborative initiative of the University of Johannesburg and the National Youth Development Agency...