With youth unemployment at crisis levels, the urgency for tangible solutions is no longer a luxury but a necessity. There lies an unprecedented opportunity—a chance for our young people to redefine South Africa’s economy through entrepreneurship.
According to the Quarter 2 report for 2024 by Statistics South Africa, unemployed young South Africans aged 15-24 years and 25-34 years continue to have the highest unemployment rates at 60,8% and 41,7% respectively further highlighting the critical need to upscale efforts to empower young South Africans.
Step Up 2 A Start Up was created to address a gap in the small business development ecosystem by targeting high-school youth on a national and digital level through theoretical and hands-on elements.
For the past decade youth-development leaders, Primestars and The YouthStart Foundation have been doing just that through the Step Up 2 A Start Up programme. The Step Up 2 A Start Up programme is specifically designed to drive innovation within the beneficiaries and has ignited the entrepreneurial spark in over 100,000 learners across communities in South Africa.
The South African Government’s growth path commits to creating 11 million jobs by 2030. The National Development Plan envisages that 90% of these jobs will be created in small and expanding companies. To achieve this, thousands of new companies will need to be created and supported by both Government and the relevant industries.
Delivering the keynote address at the 10-year celebration function in Johannesburg, Deputy Minister of Forestry, Fisheries and The Environment, Bernice Swarts, highlighted the importance of entrepreneurship as a means to combat unemployment, saying “Our youth, our entrepreneurs of today, are our future leaders and Business Corporates of tomorrow, we need to keep the momentum, if not, then do more. Our youth are hungry for opportunities, and I dare say, patience is certainly not their virtue.”
Nkosinathi Moshoana, Executive Lead on all programmes implemented and COO of Primestars comments that “Ten years is just the beginning. We are far from done and the plan is to expand our horizons, igniting a nationwide movement of green entrepreneurs, and building a legacy that will inspire generations to come. The future of our nation rests in the hands of our youth.”
