The Presidential Youth Employment Intervention, launched by President Cyril Ramaphosa in 2020 to combat youth unemployment, could be terminated if the R5bn needed to keep it going beyond March 2024 is not secured.
The programme, which has so far helped more than 1-million young people secure temporary employment, needs additional funding to scale up its efforts and to ensure its continuity, says deputy minister in the presidency Kenny Morolong.
More than 4-million young people who are not in any higher education training or employment have signed up for the programme.
“We will require over R5bn over the medium term, which means over the next three years, to have it fully funded,” Morolong said on Monday.
The intervention includes programmes such as the Presidential Employment Stimulus, the revitalised National Youth Service and private sector efforts such as the Youth Employment Service. “The basic package of support reaches out to young people who are not in employment, education or training and offers face-to-face coaching to help them solve the multiple challenges that are keeping them trapped,” said Morolong.
The Youth Employment Service is not tax funded and does not require government funding. It is wholly funded by the private sector.
The scheme was launched in October 2020 to create jobs and support livelihoods as part of efforts to aid economic recovery after the Covid-19 pandemic, and was expanded to help tackle the youth unemployment crisis.
The National Treasury’s budget projections for the next three years do not make provision for continuation of the programme beyond 2024.
The initiative connects youth to mainly short-term employment and training opportunities in finance, education, manufacturing and transport. Termination would jeopardise the government’s stated objective to reduce the rate of youth unemployment, which is higher than the national average. According to Stats SA, youth unemployment came in at 60.7% in the second quarter of 2024 and at 70.1% when using the expanded definition. In contrast, the national unemployment rate for the same period was recorded at 32.6% and at 42.1% using the expanded definition.
A report by the UN’s Development Programme flagged youth unemployment in SA as a ticking time bomb, saying that the crisis is hampering economic growth.
Budget
“Youth unemployment in SA is a multipronged challenge that limits the earning potential of youth, stymies business growth, threatens social cohesion and puts pressure on public resources,” said the report, which was released in July.
According to Rudi Dicks, who heads the project management office in the presidency, partners of the Presidential Youth Employment Intervention in the government are engaging the Treasury through the budgetary process to access more funding.
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