Even as South Africa slowly emerges from the suffocating economic grip of the Covid-19 pandemic, lately launched employment statistics continue to make for grim studying, with almost eight million individuals unemployed.
South Africa actually recorded improved financial activity in the fourth quarter of 2021, together with an expansion in real GDP of 1.2% compared to the earlier quarter, but unemployment still reached report ranges.
Denice Dumisa
According to the Quarterly Labour Force Survey (QLFS), unemployment in Q4 final year rose to 35.3% from 34.9% within the previous quarter. This is the best level because the start of the Quarterly Labour Force Survey in 2008.
Even extra alarmingly, the youth unemployment price stood at a staggering 65.5%.
The latest employment knowledge was launched on the finish of March by Statistics South Africa (Stats SA), and came simply days after South Africa managed to draw R1.2 trillion in investment during the fourth South Africa Investment Conference.
Analysts have described the country’s financial system as “producing jobless growth” and imagine that even with upward economic development in the medium time period, South Africa will still have an overall unemployment determine of around 30%.
Youth unemployment is a world problem, even more acutely pronounced in South Africa, where the latest figures are sounding critical alarm bells.
In late 2021, Stats SA reported that two out of every three young people beneath the age of 35 in South Africa are unemployed. For เกจอาร์กอน beneath 25, this rises to a few out of every 4, or a jarring 75%.
But in and amongst the dire unemployment statistics there are rays of light on the method to start to effectively handle this socio-economic crisis.
Education is essential
According to the QLFS report, of the 7,9 million unemployed individuals within the fourth quarter of 2021, as many as fifty one,6% had training levels under matric.
This variety of unemployed drops the upper the education stage. Those with a Matric pass represent 38.6% of unemployed and this figure drops considerably for those with different tertiary qualifications (6.9%) and graduates who constitute only 2.4% of South Africa’s formal unemployed.
Astron Energy’s Organisational Capability, Learning and Development Manager Lindiwe Ncongwane said: “It is an usually repeated mantra that education is the key to success, but the labour force survey definitely 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 community of retail websites including the Caltex model, runs a variety of Youth Development Programmes overlaying both educational help and office and experiential learning 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 position to play in offering opportunities for graduates and those with other qualifications to assist cut back the variety of unemployed, and in addition to assist construct a era of employable younger folks.
“Investments in training and expertise improvement, allied to training qualifications, will assist construct a workforce that is multi-skilled and in a place to adapt to a giant number of duties and industries,” she stated.
The 2020 Future of Work report by the World Economic Forum (WEF) discovered that 50% of all workers will need reskilling by 2025 as adoption of technology increases.
The report also listed crucial thinking and problem-solving as main skills employers imagine might be wanted over the following five years, while newer trends centre on self-management abilities such as energetic studying, resilience, stress tolerance and adaptability.
According to Ncongwane, a key a half of Astron Energy’s focus is to equip younger people for the world of labor, not only at Astron Energy and the petrochemical industry, but the across a spread of disciplines to allow them to be globally aggressive.
The company additionally runs numerous school-level initiatives within the STEM space, however according to the 4th Industrial Revolution’s concentrate on the 3Cs of Communication, Critical pondering and Collaboration, has broadened this to STEAM – Science, Technology, Arts and Maths – in a bid to develop problem-solving and process-based learning.
The way ahead
“As a rustic, we have to proceed investing in the schooling of our young people, notably within the crucial expertise house, after which create opportunities for them to apply these abilities and develop in office environments,” Ncongwane stated.
“As corporates we want to design a spread of programmes and initiatives to satisfy not only the needs of the business, but in addition the future of work – and critically the long run employment prospects for our young folks.
“If we do this proper, we are ready to begin changing the outlook on the employment front and make sure that economic progress has a tangible impression on the futures and livelihoods of the generations to come back.”
In the Youth Development area, 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 places of work
The Learnerships run from 1 Oct 2021 – 30 Sep 2022
Bursaries
Astron Energy runs a full Bursary programme which covers both under graduate and submit graduate studies, from 1st year to Masters Level students.
The bursaries embrace tuition charges, lodging, books, meals, cash allowances and vacation work in the form of internship/in-service-training within the company’s operations.
The programme started in 2020 and to date over 440 college students have been funded.
There are currently 196 student bursars and 15 employee bursars as part of this programme. A whole of 26 worker children are part of the bursary programme for 2022.
The bursary covers a spread of research fields this yr 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 additionally provides profitable bursars the chance to be part of the Astron Energy Graduate Training programme.
Apprenticeships
Astron Energy presents 24-month Apprenticeships in Electrical and Mechanical Engineering and Instrumentation at the refinery in Cape Town. At current, the corporate has six apprenticeships in its manufacturing division.
Graduate Programme
The Graduate Internship Programme is run in accordance with the varied disciplines required by the enterprise and runs for a period of between 18-24 months. The present intake of Graduate interns is about to finish on 31 December 2022.
Infographic
Astron Energy presently has 77 individuals 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
Share