Youth unemployment needs urgent action

THE continued youth unemployment in South Africa is becoming a crisis and the government has not been adequately proactive in implementing measures to curb these ratios.

- DR SHEETAL BHOOLA

2024 statistics have been bordering close to under 50% and this has been the trend in the last few years. In the first quarter of 2025, the ratio recorded was over 60%. Between the years of 2014 and 2024, youth unemployment increased from 39% to approximately over 60%.

The need to educate our youth with appropriate skills and knowledge has become an urgent economic measure, yet there have been 21 SETAS put in place to address this need. The SETAS were established in the year 2000 and 25 years later we still struggle with the same challenges that we had at the outset.

Initially, the launch introduced 25 SETAS which were then streamlined into 21. This was in alignment with the Skills Development Act of 1998. The big intended impact was to bridge the gap between the identified skills required and the correct related training facilitation.

This was supposed to be achieved through work-based learning opportunities that were intended to teach and groom South Africa's youth. The primary challenge has been and still is whether the correct scarce skill developmental needs have been identified and if the programmes have been effective.

Since the launch in 2000, the SETAS have been criticised for various inadequacies, such as lack of proper implementation processes as well as governance issues. Some of these issues are not only challenges within government structures but also private corporations as well as various nongovernmental industries as a result the ideal objectives are yet to be achieved all these years later.