CAPE TOWN - A month before the national
lockdown, Christine Garson wanted to leave the country to find a job overseas.
Garson has a degree in communications but had been struggling to find a job for more than three years.
Now prospects are even dimmer.
More than 60% of young people aged between 18 and 34 in South Africa are worried about Covid-19 and many are uncertain about the future and job opportunities, a study has found.
Youth organisation Lucha Lunako, in association with the Bertha Centre for Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship at the UCT Graduate School of Business and other partners conducted the survey recently.
The study also found that 30% of young people said they had lost income because of the lockdown. About 28% admitted to having borrowed money as a result of the lockdown, putting them deeper in debt.
A total of 32% said their finances had been impacted because they
could not look for work. They also said they had experienced more financial challenges.
“The survey reveals how the virus is impacting on South Africa’s youth, an extremely vulnerable segment of our population,” said Solange Rosa, director of the Bertha Centre, the first academic centre in Africa dedicated to advancing social innovation and entrepreneurship.
A total of 814 young people were polled between May 22 and June 9 on Covid-19 and how lockdown had effected their lives. Respondents came from across the country, with 88% being African, 5% coloured, 5% white and 2% of Indian descent.
Lucha Lunako is a social enterprise which explores ways to promote youth employment and skills development.
Co-founder of the organisation, Alana Bo, said the survey showed a need to “acknowledge that young people are facing a disproportionately more uncertain future than those people who have had the time to develop skills and start on their careers”.
Other finding showed more than half of those polled felt uncertain about their future and were frustrated by the inability to plan ahead.
Almost a quarter of those polled said they had not finished learning important skills they would need for jobs, with 50% saying they had access to free online courses which would help them to move forward. However, many said data was expensive and 24% had no access to wi-fi.
A young South African English teacher in China, who did not want to be identified, said she felt that she had “reached the proverbial ceiling” in the South Africa job market, at the age of 30, even though she had an honour’s degree in finance.
“There was no point in me staying home. The jobs are hard to find, I didn’t have money to buy data and even online courses were expensive.
“But now I’m studying for my Master’s degree online and gaining experience in soft skills.”
Rosa said the survey’s findings were especially important considering South Africa’s high youth unemployment, which stands at just over 58%, according to Statistics South Africa.
Rosa said the figure was especially troubling considering that 35% of young people polled had received no food assistance in their communities.