Declaration of Presidential Youth Indaba
We, representatives of youth organisations led by the South African Youth Council drawn from political formations, faith-based organisations, youth in business and co-operatives, young people with disabilities, student formations, young sports people, young environmentalists and rural youth - meeting with representatives of government, the labour movement, the private sector and community organisations.
Having met for three days in Ekurhuleni on February 28 to 3 March 2014.
Having reflected on progress made with the implementation of the Youth Employment Accord signed in April 2013.
Noting that youth make up the majority of South Africans and constitute a large part of the global population. Youth are the present, youth are the future.
Noting the strong growth in employment of young people during the last nine months of 2013, that shows the success of our joint efforts.
Welcoming the signing of the Youth Employment Accord in April 2013 and progress made in its implementation thus far.
Supporting the greater focus on youth employment in public employment schemes as well as youth entrepreneurship.
Believing we have a good story to tell about what our government and youth organisations have been able to do in the past year to promote youth empowerment, youth employment and youth skilling and welcoming the youth development story as part of the 20 years anniversary celebrations.
Believing youth need to be integrated more in the economic development of the country, as an asset, as a driver of inclusive growth and development and as a promoter of sustainable development and social inclusion.
Recognising the National Development Plan as the overall vision for the country and where we want to be by 2030 and the New Growth Path, National Infrastructure Plan and the Industrial Policy Action Plan as the specific strategies to drive the achievement of our goals.
Recognising that we can do even more using the Youth Employment Accord to turn a good story into a great story over the next five years.
We acknowledge that while much has been done, young people still face major problems with the affordability of university education, access to post-schooling, access to decent jobs and to opportunities for entrepreneurship, as well as social problems with substance abuse, teenage pregnancies and continuing challenges with HIV and TB.
Now hereby commit to the following:
We reaffirm the Youth Employment Accord as our framework for youth empowerment;
We support the scaled up implementation of the Youth Employment Accord, with clear targets to be set for each of the pillars of the Accord;
We support a bigger focus on second-chance matric. This must include work preparedness programmes;
We support the plan to expand the number of FET college campuses and the larger number of student enrolments. We welcome the decision to set up community colleges to provide a wider range of education and training pathways for young people, specifically to address the not in education, employment and training youth. This must be accompanied by stronger partnerships with companies in the private and public sectors to ensure relevant skills and provide opportunities for employment of students when they have completed their studies.
We support better transition from school to work through work exposure and career development programmes at high school, more access for students to vacation jobs, summer internships and work shadowing. More attention must be paid to maths, science, languages and ICT at school.
We call for improved internship programmes in the state and the private sector. Within the state, we call for improvement of the number of internships, starting with 20 000 a year from 2014 and rising progressively to 60 000 a year by 2018, resulting in a total of 200 000 young people given an opportunity of first work experience through government, within the next five years. Within the private sector, we call on companies to significantly scale up internships to 5 percent of total employment by 2019.
We call on youth organisations to work with state funding agencies such as the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) and Small Enterprise Finance Agency (SEFA) as well as the National Youth Development Agency (NYDA) to roll-out funding for viable youth-owned enterprises. In this regard, we welcome the R2,7 billion youth entrepreneurship fund set up by government and the partnership between NYDA and public agencies.
The state is doing much and has committed to do more on promotion of youth enterprises. But the private sector must also act more decisively to promote products of youth-owned enterprises in their supply-chains, including retailers who should provide young people with opportunities to showcase their products for consumers.
We call for the next generation Millennium Development Goals to contain youth development targets and for South Africa to propagate this view in discussions in the BRICS and United Nations.
We call for more action to create youth cooperatives and to expand involvement of young people in co-operatives. We welcome efforts to bring young people in the rural areas into skills and jobs. Programmes in government such as rural brigades via the National Youth Service and NARYSEC should be scaled up every year over the next five years.
Opportunities for youth in urban areas need to be communicated better and be scaled up in areas with large number of young people, including through the national youth service.
We call for the needs of people with disability to be recognised in skills development systems and in workplaces.
We believe the private sector needs to step up its actions in absorbing young people in fulltime employment. In our society, business people should wake up every morning recognising that we have a youth employment challenge. Government should enforce the targets for set-asides for the private sector in the green economy and infrastructure, with 60 percent youth employment and BPO with 80 percent.
We welcome the decision of the President to set up a Presidential Youth Working Group and commit to work closely with government to ensure a strong, committed dialogue on youth empowerment.
We strongly support the right of protest and free expression on issues of youth and we condemn strongly any resort to violence or destruction of property.
We call for improved focus on youth within government, including through its organisational structures and monitoring systems.
We now commit to work towards achievement of the full commitments in the Youth Employment Accord. For those who wallow in negativity and fault-finding and cannot see what a great country we have, we say, wake up and smell the coffee. Come on young man, come on young woman, choose to be part of the solution in moving South Africa forward.
Enquiries:
Brent Simons ( Spokesperson for Minister Collins Chabane)
Cell: 076 315 7330
E-mail: Brent@po.gov.za
Siyabonga Magadla
Cell: 083 465 9936
E-mail: Siyabonga.Magadla@nyda.gov.za
