SHINING A LIGHT ON JOBS
Throwing more money at formal training is not the solution to youth unemployment — it’s far trickier than that, but fortunately some institutions are showing the way
SA’s youth training system is too focused on formal skills development and is failing to address the core problem, that of bridging young people’s transition to the world of work and actually landing them their first job. This was a consensus finding of a “Solutions Exchange” summit co-hosted by the presidency, the Human Resource Development Council of SA and the Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator, outside Cape Town last month.
The delegates agreed that some of the focus
(and funding) needs to be diverted from skills development to a work-seeker support package. This would reduce the costs associated with looking for work, prepare young people for the workplace, and actively channel them into jobs.
As a result of SA’S unique spatial geography, in which millions of young people reside in townships far from economic nodes, skills deficiencies are not the only barrier, and maybe not even the biggest barrier, to finding work.
According to the Siyakha study from the Centre for Social Development in Africa, the job-search costs of the median unemployed young person are R550/month. This includes R350 on transport and R200 on print, data, and other costs.
“SA suffers from a massive geographical dislocation problem so even if you could create extensive job opportunities in Sandton or Midrand, it wouldn’t solve the problem of youth unemployment because most young people couldn’t get there,” explains Jak Koseff, a chief director in the Gauteng premier’s office.
There is no shortage of investment going into formal skills training in SA.
In addition to the R7.5bn transferred annually from the national budget to technical and vocational education and training (TVET) colleges, a further R16.6bn flows through the Setas into accred-