Exploring youth preparedness for Agricultural employment to solve unemployment in South Africa

Abstract

South Africa is currently facing a challenge of high youth unemployment as reported by Statistics South Africa. 45.5% of youth aged 15 -34 years were reported as unemployed in quarter 1 of 2024 (Statistics South Africa, 2024). This number is quite concerning given the number of initiatives that government have launched such as noted in Chipfupa et al. (2021) and Mokgomo et al. (2022). One would automatically think that government’s effort in launching programs to alleviate youth unemployment are effective however challenges continue to remain prevalent. In this study, interviews were conducted with unemployed youth from Gauteng and Mpumalanga being regions with highest GDP by province for the former and an agricultural intensive region being the third highest contributor to agriculture in South Africa for the latter (Statistics, 2023). The objective of the research was to explore the preparedness of unemployed youth to take up agriculture as employment. The research methodology was qualitative where 11 participants aged between 18 – 35 years were interviewed. Open – ended questions were asked with follow up questions to gain a broad understanding of Reponses provided. The interviews coupled with the three research questions lead to three themes being identified through the coding. These themes were further unpacked and discussed through the sub – themes, leading to the research questions being answered. The findings noted were assessed against the literature review where it was uncovered that youth in the regions interviewed were prepared to be employed in agriculture due to challenges experienced in finding employment, unlike those interviewed in another study reviewed in the literature. Clarity was obtained on why government initiatives to reduce unemployment were not effective