After completing Grade 12, many young people look to further their education as they believe this will set them on a path to employment. Thousands of students enrol in programmes at universities, Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) colleges and private colleges to gain knowledge and experience in their chosen fields.
South Africa faces a youth unemployment challenge: 3.4 million people between the ages of 15 and 24 are out of education and work. Many lack qualifications as only 7% of the unemployed have degrees.
Kyle Arries, a 32-year-old BCom graduate exemplifies this. After unemployment and a short construction stint, he joined a youth employment programme.
Arries, who recently found employment, says it's easy to give up the will to apply for jobs after two years of unsuccessful attempts.
You would continuously wake up do job searches, look on LinkedIn, look on all these platforms, looking for an opportunity for yourself and it does become very disheartening.
They explain that there is an increased need for guidance from institutions to assist young people in navigating their entry into the workforce, saying, "it is not an easy thing to go through as there's not much guidance in that aspect from maybe from your University or college that you've been studying at".
Thandiswa Moleleki, a 28-year-old LLB graduate is another example. Despite completing an internship and articles, she struggles to find a job in family law. "Waking up as an unemployed graduate is very frustrating it's disheartening and demoralising," she says.
They explained that they chose to study further to get a university degree and improve their job prospects
It's years later and I don't have formal employment. Every day you have to keep on applying hoping that things will get better so it's not a pleasant experience.
Moleleki is hopeful that they will find an opportunity to work in the field where she qualified as it remains her passion.
At this stage, I'm hopeful because that's the only way to go about this job hunting. If I were to tell myself to give up then I don't think I'd have a purpose to get up every day so the only choice I have now is to just remain hopeful.
Exploring Entrepreneurship
A lot of unemployed people in general are encouraged to pivot and use their skills and knowledge to start their businesses or explore entrepreneurship opportunities.
Moleleki says while this is often a consideration, the practicality of starting a business is difficult as many young people lack the funding required to start. This is especially true for students who did not qualify for NSFAS funding or other financial aid and accrue debt from their studies.
I inherited my first debt when I didn't have funding for tuition so already when you graduate you have a debt under your name I think the main issue is funding and then also getting employment, there's limited job opportunities so I am looking into entrepreneurship, it's just that to kick it off you need funding.
Arries says several organisations assist young people in exploring entrepreneurship. However, they believe that more organisations should get involved in assisting youth as many young people have great ideas.
There are a lot of youth that are lost in the aspect of direction but there's a lot of enthusiasm and there's a lot of great ideas out, I would say they we should have more organisations that come in to assist.
Promises of Jobs
Youth Capital's Kristal Duncan-Williams says many political parties create jobs and combat youth unemployment. This is as South Africans will head to the polls at the end of May to cast their vote in the 2024 general elections.
During a campaign, President Cyril Ramaphosa said more than one million jobs will be created over the next five years.
Duncan-Williams says it's ludicrous to promise this many jobs when the government has only managed to create approximately 8.7 million jobs over the last 30 years.
If you could only create 8.7 million jobs in 30 years, how are you going to create 5 million jobs in five years?
They add that political party manifestos don't address the real problems young people face in this country.
"The cost of looking for work, the reality of not having work experience but requiring work experience to get work, this idea that young people go through revolving doors of traineeship and training and learnerships and internships and just go from one thing to the next without it creating any sort of stable career path for them, these are the realities of the young unemployed South Africans."
