Dreams of 3% growth and a million jobs unravel as unemployment soars past 32%

SOUTH Africa's grand ambitions – through a business and government partnership to grow the economy 3% this year and, by doing so, create a million jobs is simply not happening as structural economic issues are hindering job creation prospects.

- NICOLA MAWSON

In fact, in the first three months of the year, 291,000 people lost their jobs quarter-on-quarter while there was an increase of 237,000 in the number of unemployed people. This has taken the unemployment rate to 32.9%, up from the last four months of 2024 when it was 31.9%.

The overall unemployment rate, which includes discouraged job seekers and is a truer measure of the job situation, went from 41.9% to 43.1% over the same quarter-on-quarter analysis, Statistics South Africa said on Tuesday.

Dr Elna Moolman, Standard Bank group head of South Africa Macroeconomic Research, said on the back of the data release that “the quarterly labour force survey reflects a rather bleak picture of employment in South Africa”.

Concurring, Anchor Capital economist Casey Sprake said that “it is clear that South Africa continues to grapple with a relentless rise in unemployment, casting a shadow over the country’s recovery efforts”.