Even as South Africa slowly emerges from the suffocating financial grip of the Covid-19 pandemic, lately launched employment statistics continue to make for grim reading, with nearly eight million individuals unemployed.
South Africa truly recorded improved financial activity within the fourth quarter of 2021, including an growth in real GDP of 1.2% compared to the earlier quarter, however unemployment nonetheless reached record levels.
Denice Dumisa
According to the Quarterly Labour Force Survey (QLFS), unemployment in Q4 final year rose to 35.3% from 34.9% within the earlier quarter. This is the best level for the explanation that begin of the Quarterly Labour Force Survey in 2008.
Even more alarmingly, the youth unemployment fee stood at a staggering sixty five.5%.
The newest employment information was released on the finish of March by Statistics South Africa (Stats SA), and got here just days after South Africa managed to attract R1.2 trillion in funding during the fourth South Africa Investment Conference.
Analysts have described the country’s financial system as “producing jobless growth” and consider that even with upward economic growth in the medium term, South Africa will still have an general unemployment figure of around 30%.
Youth unemployment is a worldwide concern, much more acutely pronounced in South Africa, where the most recent figures are sounding crucial alarm bells.
In late 2021, Stats SA reported that two out of every three younger individuals under the age of 35 in South Africa are unemployed. For the age cohort underneath 25, this rises to a few out of every four, or a jarring 75%.
But in and amongst the dire unemployment statistics there are rays of sunshine on tips on how to begin to effectively tackle this socio-economic disaster.
Education is vital
According to the QLFS report, of the 7,9 million unemployed individuals in the fourth quarter of 2021, as many as 51,6% had training levels under matric.
This number of unemployed drops the higher the education degree. Those with a Matric pass constitute 38.6% of unemployed and this determine drops substantially for those with different tertiary qualifications (6.9%) and graduates who represent only 2.4% of South Africa’s formal unemployed.
Astron Energy’s Organisational Capability, Learning and Development Manager Lindiwe Ncongwane stated: “It is an usually repeated mantra that schooling is the key to success, but the labour drive survey actually bears this out.
“Education allied to alternative is the golden key to breaking this cycle of unemployment and to create a future for young people within the country.”
Astron Energy, which operates South Africa’s second largest network of retail sites together with the Caltex model, runs numerous Youth Development Programmes masking each educational help and office and experiential studying opportunities.
Astron Energy’s Youth Development Programmes embrace:
Learnerships
Bursaries
Apprenticeships
In-Service-Training
Graduate Internship Programme
Opportunities
According to Ncongwane, South African Corporates have a key role to play in offering opportunities for graduates and people with different qualifications to help scale back the variety of unemployed, and also to help build a generation of employable young people.
“Investments in coaching and abilities development, allied to training qualifications, will assist build a workforce that’s multi-skilled and in a place to adapt to a giant number of tasks and industries,” she said.
The 2020 Future of Work report by the World Economic Forum (WEF) found that 50% of all employees will want reskilling by 2025 as adoption of know-how increases.
The report additionally listed critical thinking and problem-solving as main expertise employers imagine will be needed over the subsequent five years, whereas newer developments centre on self-management abilities similar to lively studying, resilience, stress tolerance and suppleness.
According to Ncongwane, a key part of Astron Energy’s focus is to equip young individuals for the world of work, not only at Astron Energy and the petrochemical trade, but the across a variety of disciplines to enable them to be globally competitive.
The firm also runs numerous school-level initiatives in the STEM area, but in line with the 4th Industrial Revolution’s focus on the 3Cs of Communication, Critical thinking and Collaboration, has broadened this to STEAM – Science, Technology, Arts and Maths – in a bid to develop problem-solving and process-based studying.
The means forward
“As a country, we’ve to continue investing within the training of our young individuals, particularly within the crucial skills house, after which create alternatives for them to apply these abilities and develop in workplace environments,” Ncongwane mentioned.
“As corporates we have to design a range of programmes and initiatives to satisfy not solely the wants of the business, but also the future of work – and critically the future employment prospects for our younger folks.
“If we do that proper, we are able to start changing the outlook on the employment front and make certain that economic progress has a tangible impression on the futures and livelihoods of the generations to return.”
In the Youth Development house, Astron Energy runs the next programmes:
Learnerships
eight X Learnerships in chemical operations at the Astron Energy refinery in Milnerton, Cape Town
20 X Learnerships in Sales and New Venture Creation at Johannesburg offices
The Learnerships run from 1 Oct 2021 – 30 Sep 2022
Bursaries
Astron Energy runs a full Bursary programme which covers each underneath graduate and submit graduate studies, from 1st year to Masters Level college students.
The bursaries embrace tuition charges, accommodation, books, meals, cash allowances and trip work within the type of internship/in-service-training inside the company’s operations.
The programme began in 2020 and so far over 440 students have been funded.
There are at present 196 scholar bursars and 15 employee bursars as part of this programme. A total of 26 worker youngsters are part of the bursary programme for 2022.
The bursary covers a spread of research fields this year together with:
BSc: Chemical Engineering/ BSc: Industrial Engineering/ BSC: Property Studies/ Masters: Industrial Psychology/ Honours: Financial Accounting/ Bcom: Economics/ BSc: Electrical Engineering/ Bcom/BA: Human Resources Management/ Bcom: Information Technology/ Bcom: Internal Auditing/ Bcom: Logistics/ Occupational Health and Safety/ Bcom: Supply Chain/ BSc: Analytical Chemistry.
Astron Energy also presents profitable bursars the opportunity to be part of the Astron Energy Graduate Training programme.
Apprenticeships
Astron Energy presents 24-month Apprenticeships in Electrical and Mechanical Engineering and Instrumentation on the refinery in Cape Town. At เกจวัดแรงดันออกซิเจน , the corporate has six apprenticeships in its manufacturing division.
Graduate Programme
The Graduate Internship Programme is run in accordance with the assorted disciplines required by the enterprise and runs for a interval of between 18-24 months. The current intake of Graduate interns is ready to finish on 31 December 2022.
Infographic
Astron Energy at present has seventy seven members in its Learnership, Apprenticeship and Graduate Internship programmes:
LogisticsGraduate Internship13
CFOGraduate Internship11
RetailGraduate Internship5
HRGraduate Internship3
HRLearnership20
C & IGraduate Internship2
CEOGraduate Internship2
ManufacturingGraduate Internship1
STOGraduate Internship3
Strategy Graduate Internship2
SHEQGraduate Internship1
ManufacturingApprentice6
ManufacturingChemical Operations Learnership8
Total77
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