THE YOUTH IN ESWATINI

THE youth, aged between 10 - 35 years, accounts for 700 000 out of 1.1 million in Eswatini and this is approximately 70 per cent of the population.

The kingdom is poised to reap the demographic dividend, however, this will take a lot of heavy investment to ensure that this young population is utilised as productively as possible to help spur growth in the country. The youth holds the power to shift the growth story of Eswatini into an even more beautiful story, currently the medium-term prospects of Eswatini looks good, I contend that it can be better if we invested more in the youth. Recent statistics show that above 50 per cent of the youth is not employed, indicating that the country is way apart from attaining full employment. This is an underutilisation of a very important resource. If we neglect the needs of the youth, the demographic dividend, which the nation ought to reap, will turn into a demographic curse and we will pay dearly for it as a country.

Population structure, economy

Current affairs have it that France is currently under turmoil after administratively extending the retirement age from 62 to 64 years. President Macron maintains that this is a just move to allow France’s pension system to survive and be sustainable. The long and short of it is that France has an ageing population and the claims now exceed the contributions into the pensions fund. I foresee this situation in Eswatini in the next 20 years, as the bulging youth grows into adulthood and become dependent on government. China, on the other hand, is faced with a shrinking population, mostly owing to the one child policy resulting in shrinking labour supply, threatening future growth prospects. The population structure plays a vital role in the growth story of a country.

Education

A youth analysis of the national budget can, at face value, conclude that the budget is youth-friendly, however, it is not responsive to the needs of the youth. Education has been allocated 19 per cent and arguably the budget is for the youth, which is a lion’s share, but is it responsive to the needs of the youth? This is a continuation of the programmes that the country has been perpetually funding and will not respond to the immediate problems facing the youth, it will do very little in solving youth unemployment. The youth needs jobs, an investment in re-training programmes in alignment with the skills audit would contribute in immediate reduction of youth unemployment.  We need to retrain the unemployed graduates to align with the required skills in the economy and this would be a relatively cheap exercise as it would only involve capacitating a person to the nearest transferrable career required by the economy, and this does not require a whole four-year degree. Tertiary institutions need to align modules with emerging needs of the economy; we cannot keep producing graduates who are not relevant. Investments aligning tertiary offerings to needs identified in the skills audit, requires investments; resulting in sustainable job creation.

Sustainable jobs

Furthermore, we can argue that the youth will benefit in the capital expenditures as employees in the construction projects. This, in my opinion, would yield short-term jobs providing temporary relief from the plight of unemployment only to circle back into the unemployment pool in a few months. We need to ensure that the youth is integrated in the value chain as service providers. Improving public procurement, making it youth-friendly, would ensure that the youth benefit from CAPEX as service providers not just as labourers. Yes, affirmative action is required as youth-led businesses cannot compete at an equal footing with big and established enterprises.

Access to finance,
entrepreneurial ability

Lastly, we can argue that the Youth Fund bridges the gap in access to capital or finance for the youth, the question would be; is it adequately capitalised and are the loan packages adequate? Given that the fundamentals of the economy are falling into place, how much have we allocated to the youth and access to finance to bolster entrepreneurship? Also, we can argue that we have a loan guarantee scheme and export guarantee schemes to assist the youth who need more money than can be funded by the YERF. I put it to you that evidence shows that only the rich and big companies benefit from these because, most of the youth cannot afford approved consultants to develop the business case for funding through a commercial bank, albeit the loan guarantee scheme. We ought to have an allocation as a country reserved for the youth and negotiate for relaxed conditions of access.

Bull by horns

This problem requires a bull by the horns approach; mainstreaming is good as a long term target, short-term direct resource allocation would prove the country’s zeal to solve youth unemployment. Re-allocate some money towards responsive areas aimed at reducing youth unemployment. History will not judge us well if we neglect the youth, we must safeguard the future of the economy.

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